Messi breaks record

Barcelona 4 - 0 Espanyol

Messi breaks record for most goals scored in a single European league season

The Argentine's record-breaking year is showing no signs of abating after he broke Dudu Georgescu's feat of 47 strikes in a single league campaign on the continent

Lionel Messi has now scored the most goals in a single European league season after netting four times in Barcelona's 4-0 victory over Espanyol on Saturday.

The prolific No.10 broke Dudu Georgescu's record of 47 goals for Dinamo Bucharest in the 1976-77 campaign when he put the Blaugrana 2-0 up during the Catalan derby at Camp Nou.

Messi is now on 50 league goals for the season, having followed up his pair of strikes with a further two more on the night and securing his eighth hat-trick of the campaign in the process.

The record is just one of several in what has been a memorable season for the Argentine, beginning with his five goals against Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League to earn him the distinction of being the competition's first player to score five in a single match.

Messi also became Barca's all-time top goalscorer and the highest scorer in one Spanish season, while in the past week, his treble against Malaga meant he broke Gerd Muller's long-standing 67-goal haul in one campaign.

Source: goal.com