Lionel Messi hit his seventh Champions League hat-trick to teach Pep Guardiola a tough lesson

THIS was  the night that left Pep Guardiola’s City project in a right old Messi.

It is not bossing Barcelona that  Pep misses the most — it is having Lionel Messi on his side.

Pep is very much part of Barca’s past.

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Manchester City hope he can produce the same brand of football at the Etihad. And that is where it all falls a bit flat.

For there is only one Messi. And as good as City looked in patches, Messi made the  difference. Just as he did when Pep was Barca coach.

Johan Cruyff put Barca on the global map. As a player and then a visionary coach.

But if Cruyff was the brains, Pep was the life and soul.

You could say that if Pep  redefined Barca as a coach from 2008 to 2012 — when they won 14 out of 19 trophies they contested — Messi is the one that defined the side on the pitch.

He also defined Pep’s coaching career. And he still does. Because now he’s not playing for Guardiola, but against him.

Claudio Bravo got a Nou Camp standing ovation even after being sent off. But Pep? Nada. Zilch.

Not before, nor during the match. Almost as if he had never bossed Barca. Never mind being the most successful coach in their history. His return “home” was a non-event.

Guardiola is now a rival. City’s top-down structure made this essentially a Catalan civil war.

The “people that left” Barca’s most successful ever side now boss City on and off the pitch.

If you think City’s third kit is an abomination, remember this. Barca’s Dream Team wore this kind of “orange” at Wembley in 1992 when they won their first European Cup.

Pep started for Barca that night and Txiki Begiristain — now City’s technical director — was an unused sub.

And if you look in the middle part of City’s shirt, it is actually blue and red — “Blaugrana”.

The colours of Barca.

It is not even cryptic. Not a nod and a wink, this.  It is in-your-face, two fingers up at Barca’s current president.

The message? “We are going to create a better version of  Barcelona at the Etihad.”

Apart from the weather, the food, architecture and the beach, there is also a fundamental  difference between Manchester and Barcelona. Messi.

When Messi scored, Pep turned with hands in pockets and walked to his bench, picked up a bottle of water and took a giant sip.

He needed a sip of something stronger when he did the same as Messi completed his hat-trick.

Quizzed before the match whether he tapped Messi up, he HAD to say no.

Same for all the other Barca stars City targeted — Neymar, Sergio Busquets and Luis Suarez.

You don’t go “back home” and tell your old neighbours you tried it on with their wives, do you?

Guardiola is treading a fine line trying to lead City to world domination and maintain his reputation at the Nou Camp.

Right now, City’s bids and approaches cost Barca huge sums as they desperately offer new deals to keep hold of their best players.

Three members of the 1992 Dream Team came to manage in the English top flight.

First was Michael Laudrup at Swansea. Then Ronald Koeman, who impressed at Southampton before moving to Everton.

Lastly, Pep. Poignantly, he faced Dream Team team-mate Koeman last Saturday, a 1-1 draw in the run-up to this, a  second reunion with his boyhood club.

The first with Bayern Munich went badly 18 months ago. The response of the Nou Camp public was lukewarm.  Polite applause.

Last night there was not even that. On the pitch Messi did the business. Ditto last night.

Far from focusing on Guardiola, fans booed Uefa’s anthem and lifted their Esteladas — the star-spangled Catalan flags of independence — 30,000 of them.

An act of defiance against Uefa, who fine the Catalans for the “political” message.

Pep, a fiercely proud Catalan, must still appreciate the political side of Barca.

But he preferred to stay in the tunnel where he had a warm-hearted brief chat with rival boss and old team-mate Luis Enrique.

The night was predictably Messi for Pep.

His last game as Barca boss here was a 4-0 Catalan derby win over Espanyol when Pep and his entire staff and players famously did a “Ring-a-Ring ‘o Roses” in the centre circle.

On that  night, Messi scored ALL four.

If Messi’s hat-trick last night was not enough then the chants of “Luis Enrique” from the Nou Camp surely provided the epilogue for Pep.