Lionel Messi narrowly escaped being sent-off after headbutting Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa as Barcelona's friendly with Roma became anything but friendly on Wednesday night. <br /> <br />Roma knew they were in for a frustrating evening at the Nou Camp chasing the shadows of the European Champions and after going 1-0 down to Neymar's opener French international Mapou lost his temper with Messi leaning his head in towards the Barcelona No 10 and making clear contact. <br /> <br />Messi responded by butting the French defender and grabbing him by the throat. The Spanish referee Javier Estrada Fernandez could easily have sent both players off - Mapou for the original aggression and Messi for the retaliation but instead showed the pair yellow cards and the game continued 11 against 11. <br /> <br />Alessandro Florenzi was then booked for going cynically through the back of Neymar and Radja Nainggolan made it a hat-trick of cautions for the visitors in the first half when he went into the book for complaining. <br /> <br />But it was impossible for things to turn too ugly as Barcelona produced some of the beautiful football that won them the treble last season to beat Rudi Garcia's team. <br /> <br />Their second goal was picture book with Luis Suarez dribbling in from the right past Vasilis Torosidis and feeding Dani Alves who teed-up Neymar. <br /> <br />He laid the ball off to Messi who found the corner with a vicious curling shot. <br /> <br />That doubled Barca's lead after the Brazilian had opened on the scoring on 26 minutes.
