Watch Cristiano Ronaldo score a hat trick in eight minutes for Real Madrid
For those who didn't wake up at 6 a.m. ET to watch Real Madrid annihilate Granada 9-1 at the Santiago Bernabeu on Sunday, you missed a lot of goal scoring – the majority of it done by Cristiano Ronaldo.
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Ronaldo helped Real unmercifully tear apart a Granada side that sits 19th in the La Liga standings by scoring five times – including a hat trick in just eight minutes – to help Los Blancos move within a point of first-place Barcelona (which plays Sunday at Celta de Vigo). Ronaldo now has 36 league goals, four more than Messi, in the race to become La Liga's top scorer.
Amazingly, Ronaldo had never scored five goals in a game before Sunday. After Gareth Bale opened the scoring in the 25th minute, Ronaldo began his assault on Granada with a curling strike set up by James Rodriguez in the 30th minute.
Six minutes later, goalkeeper Oier Olazabal deflected a hard cross by Marcelo high into the air. The ball fell at the feet of Ronaldo, who let it bounce before burying the one-time strike for goal No. 2.
Ronaldo's third goal probably should've been saved, but it was a classic CR7 strike nonetheless with him dribbling from the left wing. Instead of feeding an overlap run on the outside, Ronaldo caught the Granada defense ball-watching as he quickly unleashed a vicious strike straight at Olazabal, whose parry attempt couldn't keep the ball out for a 4-0 Real Madrid cushion.
Ronaldo could've ended up with eight goals. After Karim Benzema scored his second to make it 7-0, Ronaldo failed to convert on chances created by Bale and Alvaro Arbeloa and missed out on a tap-in on Granada defender Diego Mainz's own goal that made it 8-1 Real.
Can't wait to see what Messi does against Celta.
