First published in Daily Maverick 168

Lionel Messi seemed to be back to the peak of his powers as Barcelona eased 2-0 past Juventus to rise to the summit of Group G in the UEFA Champions League. They currently sit on six points from two games.

The Argentine magician laid on one for Ousmane Dembele, and scored one himself in the victory. However, what caught the attention of most is that the 33-year-old seemed to be enjoying his football once more as he pirouetted and pivoted imperiously all over the Juventus stadium.

His performance, against a Juventus team missing the Covid-19 positive Cristiano Ronaldo, led to former Inter Milan striker-turned-pundit Christian Vieri heaping praise on the six-time Ballon d’Or winner.

“Messi is a magician; he’s the Harry Potter of soccer and when he stops playing, I’m throwing my TVs away. I’m not going to work no more on TV, I’m going to watch Netflix, that’s it, because when he stops there’s nothing else to watch,” Vieri told CBS Sports.

Messi’s latest masterclass comes after the resignation of Barcelona president Josep Maria Bartomeu, who stepped down on Tuesday along with his board of directors, following mounting pressure from fans and his public falling-out with Messi.

His performance will give all those associated with Barcelona hope that he is back to his best, is happy and will extend his contract, which is set to expire in 2021.

While there is a ray of hope that things might be on the up in Catalunya, Barcelona’s bitter rivals Real Madrid have endured a torrid time so far in their Champions League campaign.

Los Blancos were held to a 2-2 draw by Borussia Mönchengladbach. They left it until the last moments of the game to mount a comeback, having trailed 2-0 for almost the entire 90 minutes.

However, goals by Karim Benzema and Casemiro salvaged a point for them.

It didn’t do them much good in Group B though. Zinedine Zidane’s men are rooted to the foot of the table after picking up just this one point from their two games. They host Italian side Inter in their next European game, and will be keen to use that game as a springboard to kick on – lest they find themselves embarrassingly missing out on qualifying for the knockout stages of the tournament.

The four English sides in the competition, Liverpool, the two Manchester teams and Chelsea, all secured comprehensive wins as they scored a total of 14 goals and conceded none in their game week two fixtures.

Manchester United were the biggest winners, brushing aside last year’s semifinalists RB Leipzig 5-0, thanks in part to a Marcus Rashford hat trick.

Liverpool’s 2-0 victory against Danish side Midtjylland came with an unwanted headache for manager Jurgen Klopp. After the injury to Brazilian midfielder Fabinho – playing at centre-back again in the absence of Virgil Van Dijk and Joel Matip – it means that the Reds are extremely short of defence options.

Joe Gomez is the only remaining senior centre back, and it remains to be seen how Klopp will solve this latest conundrum.

According to recently departed Liverpool midfielder Adam Lallana, the German manager will find a way to work around this headache.

“He’ll meet the challenge face on, the lads will be in tomorrow [Wednesday] and they’ll recover and he’ll pick a team to beat West Ham. Okay, it’s going to be a test but it’s a test that he’ll love and the lads will get together and help each other out,” Lallana told BT Sport.

Meanwhile, Frank Lampard would’ve been pleased to see all his superstar attackers combine in their 4-0 victory. Chelsea struggled for large periods against Krasnodar of Russia; however, they eventually kicked on and secured a comfortable victory.

New signings Timo Werner and Hakim Ziyech were on the scoresheet, alongside American starlet Christian Pulisic. German midfielder Kai Havertz laid one on for Callum Hudson-Odoi.

Those developments will hand hope to those who follow the club that things are finally coming together.

The team’s third successive clean sheet will also be a welcome boost for a side that has displayed defence frailties galore under Lampard’s leadership. DM168