One brilliant header, one powerful right-foot shot, another struck firmly with his left, and a clever flick with the outside of his right foot. Four different goals by Luis Suarez with one connection – they were all scored against Joe Hart.
If anybody is looking forward to the second leg of Barcelona v Manchester City it is surely Suarez, who seems to love playing against Hart. All those goals came in the last two games when Suarez and Hart faced each other: Uruguay’s 2-1 win against England at the World Cup, and Barcelona’s 2-1 victory at the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday.
Hart must be sick of the sight of him, regardless of his comments after Tuesday’s last-16 first leg. “Luis Suarez is a fantastic player, he took his goals well,” he said. “I thought we actually controlled him well apart from the two goals.”
Hart’s late penalty save from Lionel Messi gave City some hope, and he correctly pointed out that Suarez did not have another shot on target – but his was a very optimistic view.
Messi could not score from the penalty spot past Hart but Suarez was so confident of beating him in the World Cup that on two occasions he tried to score direct from a corner – and nearly succeeded.
The better of his goals in Manchester was the second, a killer strike in the 30th minute. He knew exactly where he needed to be to get to Jordi Alba’s cross before Martin Demichelis, and expertly steered it past Hart.
Suarez spoke of the “open spaces” left by City and will be confident of adding to his repertoire against Hart at Camp Nou on March 18.
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