Lionel Messi steers Barcelona to crushing win over Stuttgart

Posted Thursday, March 18, 2010 by theguardian.com

Lionel Messi was in imperious form for Barcelona, scoring twice and setting up another.

After beginning the evening with their hopes of progression in the balance, Barcelona returned to their thrilling best at Camp Nou and can now be considered favourites to retain the European Cup.

Much of this optimism can be hung on the form of Lionel Messi, the little forward who with two goals of alarming quality and one assist left Stuttgart wondering how they managed to head into the second leg on level terms. The Argentinian now has seven goals in his past four games.

"He was so decisive," the Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola said of the player. "Every great has a tendency to influence his team, like [Michael] Jordan with the Chicago Bulls. He's the best. We wouldn't trade him for anybody."

The Stuttgart manager Christian Gross was equally in thrall to the 22-year-old. "His ability is incredible when you consider his age," he said. "I think it's fair to compare him to [Diego] Maradona."

Barcelona's preparations were hampered when the midfielder Xavi was ruled out for a fortnight with a leg injury, but they hardly wanted for fluency as they took the lead after 13 minutes. Messi ran at a retreating Stuttgart defence and then lashed a searing drive from the edge of the area past Jens Lehmann.

Stuttgart proffered briefly through Pavel Pogrebnyak but their plan to attack the 2009 winners was shredded as soon as Pedro made it 2-0 midway through the first half. Messi's angled pass into the area was perfectly weighted for Yaya Touré, who slipped the ball across the six-yard box for Pedro to tap in.

Messi's second was no less spectacular as he collected Dani Alves's flicked backheel pass, veered towards the left before swiftly switching direction and curling his shot into the bottom right corner. He then had two chances to get a hat-trick, being denied by a superb Lehmann save and then dinking the ball wide with only the goalkeeper to beat.

Barça's dominance was confirmed when Zlatan Ibrahimovic produced a neat through ball to set up his fellow substitute Bojan Krkic, who scored with his first touch. "To reach the quarter-finals is very important," Guardiola added. "We were very, very intense in all facets, very aggressive. We played a great game."