FC Barcelona vs. Athletic Bilbao, 5-1

[flywoman]

With this win, Barcelona has made the best start in La Liga history.

Today's match against Athletic Bilbao wasn't flawless, but it certainly was brilliant. Athletic Bilbao pressed hard and attempted to play a possession game much like Barcelona's own, but although they had some good chances and a goal, they simply couldn't compete with eleven of our boys in good form.

Our opening goal came, surprisingly, from defender Gerard Pique, his first of the season. A corner kick from Leo Messi sent the ball into Cesc Fabregas' path. His shot was blocked by the goalkeeper, but Geri found himself all alone in front of the rebound and coolly kicked it home. 1-0. Just a few minutes later, a lovely through ball from Xavi found Messi making a run in front of two defenders. The player guarding the far post attempted to block his shot but only managed to kick it up into the top of the net. 2-0. And right before halftime, Cesc received a pass from a beleaguered Messi, turned, and timed his pass perfectly to defender Adriano Correia's run into the box on the right. 3-0.

The first goal after halftime went to Cesc, who snuck past the visitors' defense to convert an intuitive pass from Andres Iniesta into a powerful shot on target. 4-0. To their credit, Athletic Bilbao did not lose heart. Ten minutes later, they had succeeded in passing the ball up to Ibai Gomez, who easily outran Geri and Adriano to go one on one with keeper Victor Valdes. 4-1.

But the last goal of the evening belonged to Leo Messi. In the left corner, Pedro Rodriguez beat his pursuers to pass to Jordi Alba, who missed the ball. But as it slid past him, Messi picked it up, dribbled a few steps, and kicked it clinically up into the top right corner of the net. This made 84 goals in a calendar year for this magical little man, just one short of the all-time record by Gerd Müller. It also drew him level with Cesar, Barcelona's highest La Liga scorer, with 190 in his career. And Messi is still only 25 years old.

Can I just say that not only is Jordi Alba an amazing player, he is also the most adorable little hug machine. No matter who scores or whether he's been involved, he always seems to join the celebration first.



In other news, Real Madrid beat Atletico Madrid 2-0 today, putting Barcelona ahead of the second place La Liga team by six points. No doubt this improved the mood of Cristiano Ronaldo, who broke his three match "drought" and also assisted Mesut Ozil in a great goal.

And finally, have some hot half-naked footballers:


Thiago's underpants... I can't even...