beIN SPORTS

By David Cartlidge (@davidjaca)

When he eventually walks away from the game, there will be many images of Lionel Messi used to identify him.

Perhaps none however, will be as iconic as that fine one at the Santiago Bernabeu on Sunday evening. Messi, who had been roughed up and rattled all game - including being on the receiving end of an elbow and two-footed lunge - took off his shirt and made his way to the corner of the pitch. There he lifted said shirt up, with his name and number facing the people who despise him most.

Messi, ’10’. 

They did not need a reminder of who he was, it’s perhaps the most iconic name and number combination in the game, but he gave them one anyway. It will be the image that ends every Messi montage played in the upcoming years. It will be on t-shirts, people’s skin and on walls. Just like the stilled shot of Johan Cruyff performing his famous turn, and Pele with his fist clenched in joy while propped up by Gerson. All the greats have their images and this will be Messi’s. 

The game itself will go down as one of Messi’s most memorable too, as he kept Barcelona’s dreams of retaining their LaLiga title alive. Even if it doesn’t end up being so, Messi can look back on the display with fondness. It was what the Argentinean at his most pure. The slalom run for his opener was graceful, and poignant. His finish on the winner was clinical and ice cold.

It also happened to be Messi’s 500th with Barça and a landmark he won’t forget now for more reasons than one. It might get lost in the furore of what was an incredible game, but it’s another stunning achievement - and all while he is still 30-years-old. The spread of goals includes 343 in LaLiga, and 94 in the Champions League. Messi has scored at every moment too. Against the smaller teams, but against the bigger teams.

On Sunday, he faced the biggest. And the stage was fitting too.

As Real Madrid’s players dropped to the floor in disbelief, Messi grew taller. Earlier in the game he had been out for the count, laying on the field with blood around his mouth. But as he’s done so often, he got back up and responded in remarkable fashion. Cristiano Ronaldo is often referred to as on his way out. Zlatan Ibrahimovic was told he’d fail in the Premier League. Often these players are derided, and their decline is spoken of with joyful glee. But when they respond there is only silence, and as Messi hoisted his shirt up even his greatest critics could not reply. It was his moment.

And in that single moment he is on top of the world and no one can deny him his place. It helped Barça go level at the top on 75 points with Real Madrid, and there are just five rounds left in the season. A fixture with Celta Vigo stands out for Zinedine Zidane’s side, a game in hand, in the last week of the campaign. Barça however hold a better goal difference and crucially in Spain, the head-to-head record.

There is also the matter of Barça having no Champions League commitments. Real Madrid meanwhile face perhaps the most gruelling test - Atletico Madrid not once, but twice. Throw in that Diego Simeone’s men might be on the biggest revenge mission that ever existed in soccer too.

Regardless of your allegiance, Messi’s celebration was magnificent in what it actually was. It was what every fan yearns for. Rubbing it in the face of your greatest adversary, on their own turf. There was something startling about it as while Messi is no angel, nor perfect as many make him out to be, the celebration seemed out of the ordinary. He was clearly scorned somewhat and responded in the most ruthless of manners.

It was perfect from Messi, or you could say, it was picture perfect.