Argentina defeated Australia 1-0 thanks to Messi's lightning-fast goal. Lionel Messi scored the fastest goal of his international career after 79 seconds to delight Argentina fans in Beijing.



When Argentina won the ball in Australia's half in the second minute, Messi was found by Enzo Fernandez and beat the keeper with a curling shot from outside the box. Fans immediately got their money's worth.


The national hero of the country has shown no signs of slowing down ahead of his 36th birthday next week.


Messi stated, "We always enjoy being with the national team." The heat and humidity made playing difficult, but beyond that, we continued with the same concept.


Since he arrived in Beijing last week, Messi has attracted a lot of attention.


The captain of Argentina has a large following in China, a country where football is popular. Given the poor state of the men's national team, fans frequently look elsewhere for teams to follow.


In recent days, there have been a lot of people wearing replica Argentina jerseys in the vicinity of the stadium as well as the hotel where Messi and his teammates have been staying.


Every day, hundreds of people waited in line outside the hotel in hopes of seeing Messi leave for training.


As the teams entered the field, they were greeted by a sea of blue and white, with the vast majority of the 68,000 fans wearing Argentina gear.


Lionel Scaloni, the coach of Argentina, told the enthusiastic crowd, "Today the stadium looked like we were playing in Argentina."


He praised his team's victory in a "difficult game," adding, We continued to compete, which is the team's best quality.



Argentina increased their lead by two in the second half when substitute German Pezzella scored with a free header after substitute Rodrigo De Paul floated in a tempting cross into the box.


A Messi-wearing fan ran onto the field just before the goal corner was taken, gave the confused Argentine a brief hug, evaded several flailing security guards, and then ran to the center circle and gave goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez a high five.


He continued to outrun stewards and outmaneuver them before running back to Australia's box, where they eventually grabbed him and took him away, cheering him on from the packed house.


The match on Thursday was a rematch of the match between Argentina and Australia in the last-16 of the World Cup in Qatar last winter.


Messi scored a goal and hounded the Socceroos' defense in that match, which the Albiceleste won 2-1.


The World Cup was won by Argentina for the first time in 36 years.


On Monday, the South Americans will play another friendly match against Indonesia in Jakarta to conclude their Asian tour.


Somewhere else on Thursday, Takefusa Kubo scored one objective and set up two others as Japan whipped El Salvador 6-0 in Toyota to get their most memorable success since the World Cup.


Japan, which is aiming to win a record fifth Asian Cup in January in Qatar, won for the first time since they lost to Croatia in the World Cup's last 16 after drawing with Uruguay and losing to Colombia in March friendlies.