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A stroke of genius? Or disrespectful?

Lionel Messi’s penalty-pass to Luis Suarez has been the topic of much debate this week.

The Barcelona forwards made jaws drop on Sunday night when Messi, on track for his 300th La Liga goal, unselfishly rolled his penalty to the side to meet the onrushing Suarez, who slotted home to secure his hat-trick.

It was inventive. It was cheeky. But it’s also been done before.

And one of the first recorded instances involved an Everton hero.

Mike Trebilcock, who struck twice at Wembley in 1966 to help bring the FA Cup back to Goodison, was the beneficiary of an identical penalty trick on November 21, 1964.

Plymouth Argyle beat Manchester City 3-2 in a Division Two game at Home Park. The winning goal came from Trebilcock - after the referee gave the Pilgrims a penalty, Johnny Newman tapped the ball sideways, enabling Trebilcock to race in and fire home.

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According to an accompanying article, Argyle had already employed the trick once before.

Newman was involved again - on February 6, 1961, in a 5-3 League Cup fourth-round, second replay defeat to Aston Villa. This time, Wilf Carter nudged the ball for Newman to run in and crash home.

The nearest variation to the ‘two-touch’ penalty can be tracked back even further; all the way to June 5, 1957 in fact, when Belgium entertained Iceland in a World Cup qualifying tie. Already leading 6-1, Belgium were awarded a 44th-minute penalty. Up stepped Rik Coppens to take it, but instead of firing towards Björgvin Hermannsson in the Iceland goal, Coppens nonchalantly passed to team-mate André Piters, who returned the favour, enabling the former to score past a stunned Hermannsson. The match ended 8-3 and Coppens went on to be voted 73rd on a list of all-time great Belgians.

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One of the more recent, and memorable, incidents like this was back in 2005 when Arsenal winger Robert Pires tried the same thing to set up team mate Thierry Henry, but hilariously missed the ball, leaving both Frenchmen embarrassed.

Johan Cruyff probably takes the crown for the silkiest attempt after tapping the ball to his side to Jesper Olsen, who drew the keeper off his line before slotting it back to Cruyff to tap it in to the empty net, leaving their opponents stunned.