Lionel Messi has been named Spain’s La Liga player of the month for January – the first time he has won the award.

The award has been given out since the beginning of the 2013-14 La Liga season, but the five-time FIFA Ballon d’Or winner had not won it until now.

The Barcelona forward finally won the award at the 23rd time of asking after scoring six goals in as many league games in January.

The 28-year-old struck a hat-trick against Granada as well as scoring in victories over Athletic Bilbao, Malaga and Atletico Madrid to take his total of league goals for the season to 12.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.