Barcelona star Messi smiles with family as he celebrates his son's second birthday

Barcelona star Lionel Messi celebrated his youngest son Mateo's birthday with his wife Antonella Roccuzzo and his other son Thiago over the weekend.

The Argentina international posted a picture of the four of them  on his official Instagram account.

It was all smiles from Messi and his family as they stood  by a canvas on a sketch easel that wished Mateo a happy second birthday.

The 30-year-old has earned himself some much-needed down time following his match-winning performance at the weekend.

Messi shone for Barcelona netting a hat-trick as the Catalan giants capitalised on Real Madrid's slip-up against Levante with a 5-0 thumping of local rivals Espanyol on Saturday.

Barcelona boss Ernesto Valverde hailed his performance as extraordinary.

'I am happy for Leo who scored three goals, he's extraordinary,' Valverde said at a post-match press conference.

Valverde had resisted the temptation to throw Ousmane Dembele straight into the thick of the action following the 20-year-old's big-money switch from Borussia Dortmund, but the France international came on for his debut after 68 minutes and set up Luis Suarez for their fifth.

'The idea is to give Dembele minutes, we have a lot of hopes for him and this game was a first step,' the Barcelona coach said.

'His team-mates know that he has real quality.'

Despite Barcelona's positive start, Valverde wants to keep things in perspective as they look to maintain an advantage over champions Real Madrid.

he said: 'We are at the beginning of the season and the distances are not significant, but it is better to be ahead than behind.'

Barcelona have won all three of their opening La Liga games and top the table four points clear of Madrid.

But they will turn their attentions away from the league as they face a home tie against Juventus next in their Champions League curtain raiser, a repeat fixture of the 2015 final.