When the best player in the world, perhaps the best to ever play the game, is in the kind of form he showed against PSV Eindhoven, God help the rest of the teams in the Champions League.
An opening day hat-trick for Lionel Messi, not only made him the player with the most trebles in the history of the competition and brought him even closer to Cristiano Ronaldo on the all-time scoring list.
It also won a game for Barcelona that was proving to be a reasonably difficult assignment at times.
Mark Van Bommel, returning to the Camp Nou as a coach, and with a team who were in great form themselves having won all of their seven games since he took over, clearly had a game plan.
A 5-4-1 formation stifled Barcelona to some degree in the opening half hour, with the Dutch side happy to play on the counterattack when the breaks came their way.
Dembele’s run at the heart of PSV’s defence earned the Catalans a free-kick, and as we’ve seen so many times before from that position, Messi is deadly. Indeed, it was his eighth direct free-kick of the calendar year, but even better was to follow.
A congested midfield made it difficult for Barca to create, but the second, when it arrived, was of the highest quality.
Often criticised as a waste of money last season, Dembele has shown in a handful of games already in this campaign just why Barcelona were so keen to secure his services.
Turning away from two opponents, he accelerated towards goal and let fly. You’d be hard pressed to find a better goal in this round of Champions League matches.
Not to be outdone, the captain wanted the final word, and within two minutes he latched on to a pass from Rakitic to drive it home before the keeper had a chance to move.
Game over at that point, although one must give credit to PSV for still taking the game to the hosts.
It was just such a move which led to Samuel Umtiti’s regrettable sending off, meaning he will miss the next game at Wembley against Tottenham Hotspur.
There was still time for more, and who else but Messi would provide the piece de resistance.
On his weaker foot, the Argentinian rifled home a fourth, his third, three minutes from time, and sent another message in bold letters; Barcelona really do want this Champions League.
Would you bet against them?
