Suarez revels in MSN reunion

Luis Suarez partnered Lionel Messi and Neymar for the first time this season, and the trio combined to devastating effect to record Barca's biggest ever margin of victory in Europe's top competition.

Published : Sep 14, 2016 09:14 IST

Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez celebrate against Celtic.

Barcelona striker Luis Suarez says he enjoyed the return of the fabled 'MSN' forward line as the Spanish champion hammered Celtic 7-0 in its opening Champions League Group C game.

Suarez partnered Lionel Messi and Neymar for the first time this season, and the trio combined to devastating effect to record Barca's biggest ever margin of victory in Europe's top competition.

Former Liverpool striker Suarez scored the final two goals after earlier laying on an assist for Messi, who scored a record sixth hat-trick in the tournament and teed up his Uruguayan team-mate's second strike. Neymar, meanwhile, added four assists - including one for Andres Iniesta's sumptuous volley - to cap a dazzling display in which he also curled home a fine free-kick.

And Suarez was delighted to be able to line up alongside Messi and Suarez once more as Barca put its shock LaLiga loss to Alaves last weekend behind it.

"There have been a lot of games where we haven't been together - we've been on holiday, Neymar was at the Olympics," he told TV3. "Now we have the opportunity to come back and enjoy ourselves together. We tried to enjoy helping the team to get the three points in the Champions League."

Suarez accepts that Barca's league title defence has already suffered a blow after that 2-1 defeat to Alaves, but he insists it was no reason to panic.

"We're human. It's normal for us to have a bad day," he said. "We know that LaLiga is long, we lost three points that we didn't expect to and now we know that it depends only on us and that there is no margin for error. It's already become difficult for us."

Suarez scored 59 goals in 53 appearances in a stunning 2015-16 season and, despite having already netted six times in six games this term, he does not expect to match those numbers again.

"The important thing is to keep the team at a high level as a whole," he added. "It's difficult to surpass the figures of last season. But what I want is to win collective titles."