Atletico Madrid striker Julián Álvarez has said he took a page out of Lionel Messi’s book for his stunning free kick at Camp Nou. Recall that the Argentina international curled a free kick into the top corner on the stroke of half-time to give Atlético Madrid the lead against Barcelona in their Champions League quarter-final.
Reacting, Alvarez said he can’t forget Messi’s free-kick goal against Liverpool at the Camp Nou 7 years ago, and he was very optimistic immediately he struck the ball.
Julian, however, added that the tie is not over yet because Barcelona will not give up until the final whistle.
His words, “I’ve watched Messi’s goal against Liverpool [in May 2019] here [at the Camp Nou] several times, but I wasn’t entirely sure it was going into that exact corner.
Once you strike the ball, you realise it, and even before I kicked, I was already quite certain. We were practising yesterday and I hadn’t converted a single one. Today was what mattered.
It isn’t over yet. We know what sort of team they are. The truth is, we have the upper hand and we need to make the most of our home crowd.”
On his future at the club, “I’m in good form at the moment. I feel great, and the most important part of the season is coming up. We need to keep working hard because there are great things ahead.”
WOW.
Lionel Messi, also known as Leo Messi, is an Argentine professional footballer who plays as a forward for and captains both Major League Soccer club Inter Miami and the Argentina national team. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Messi has won a record seven Ballon d’Or awards and a record six European Golden Shoes, and in 2020 he was named to the Ballon d’Or Dream Team.
Until leaving the club in 2021, he had spent his entire professional career with Barcelona, where he won a club-record 35 trophies, including ten La Liga titles, seven Copa del Rey titles and the UEFA Champions League four times.
With his country, he won the 2021 Copa América and the 2022 FIFA World Cup. A prolific goalscorer and creative playmaker, Messi holds the records for most goals in La Liga (474), most hat-tricks in La Liga (36) and the UEFA Champions League (eight), and most assists in La Liga (192) and the Copa América (17).
He also has the most international goals by a South American male (103). Messi has scored over 800 senior career goals for club and country, and has the most goals by a player for a single club (672).
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