Suarez scores four, Messi gets hat trick in Barcelona beatdown of Valencia

499 … 500 … 501 …

Lionel Messi scored some goals on Wednesday.

And as it happens, he approached, reached and then eclipsed the 500-mark for career goals, propelling the 28-year-old Barcelona forward even higher into the sport's rarified atmosphere.

Oh, and Barca demolished creaking southern Spanish powerhouse Valencia 7-0 in the first leg of their Copa del Rey semifinal. Luis Suarez scored four goals of his own, plunging Valencia's novice manager Gary Neville deeper into despair. This made very real the possibility that he'll soon have to make way for the club's fourth manager this season, after enormous offseason investment in the playing squad has produced only mediocrity.

[ Copa del Rey: Barcelona vs. Valencia | Scores and Schedule ]

All night long, Luis Enrique's men encircled their shell-shocked opponents and found vast pockets of space between the lines and behind the defense. And that isn't a wise way to set up against the Andres Iniesta-Neymar-Messi-Suarez diamond, which is now surely the finest attacking foursome the game has ever seen.

In the sixth minute, Neymar, who had only just been shoved off the field and into a camera trench by a defender, tweaking his leg, galloped through the middle of the field and served up Suarez, who scored easily with a tidy finish.

Suarez soon got another. Sergio Busquets clipped a perfect ball over the top, which was cut back by Aleix Vidal for Suarez to smash home.

That attack moved through nine field players.

Before the half hour, Messi got on the board when he concluded a scything attack through the heart of Valencia's defense. Iniesta's side-footed pass was back-heeled on by Neymar and dummied by Suarez, letting it roll into the path of Messi, who had all the time in the world to score. It was soccer poetry.

Let's get a close-up.

Barcelona almost got two more before the half. But Messi hit the bar on a breakaway with Suarez and Neymar clipped the post when Shkodran Mustafi, the last man, took Messi out and got sent off and punished with a penalty.

But before the hour, Messi got his 500th career goal in competitive club and national team games. Suarez set him up with a backheel, and the little Argentine then held off one defender, sent another flying the wrong way, and finished against the grain.

He'd complete his hat-trick in the 74th minute, when he won the ball in Valencia's own penalty area and lashed it home.

And then it was Suarez's turn again. He met a lofted Adrian cross with a leaping header …

… and then dinked his fourth off the inside of the near post off the Arda Turan feed.

With Barca all but in the Copa del Rey final, the chance of winning six trophies in a single season, something not even Barcelona itself has ever done (although it did do it in a calendar year in 2009), remains intact.

Leander Schaerlaeckens is a soccer columnist for Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter @LeanderAlphabet.