‘Can't praise Lewandowski enough’

Robert Lewandowski scored a hat-trick in his first Champions League game for Barcelona to power the Catalans to an emphatic 5-1 home win over Viktoria Plzen on Wednesday.

Lewandowski has now scored eight goals in just five appearances for his new team in all competitions.

"I knew from the beginning here it was going to be important to adapt right from the first game," he told uefa.com.
"Today is my wife's birthday so the goals and the birthday were for her. The fact that she was in the stadium on her birthday means a lot. Something amazing for me."

"That's how Robert is, insatiable," said coach Xavi Hernandez of the striker Barca paid Bayern Munich 45 million euros for in a big summer of spending in a bid to return the club to past glories.

"The way he trains, the way he helps the team, his humility, his work-rate...I can't praise him enough because it's not just about his hat-trick, it's the way he works, how he knows to dominate the tempo of the game," Xavi added.

It was Lewandowski's sixth hat-trick in the Champions League and he became the first player in the competition's history to score one for three different clubs, having netted trebles for Bayern and Borussia Dortmund.