Late Messi goal saves punter a fortune

Lionel Messi came to the rescue of Argentina when he whipped an arching effort into the net to beat a stubborn Iran side 1-0 on Saturday.

He has been rightly lauded for scoring a second consecutive match-winning goal for his side.

However, unbeknownst to Messi, his strike will have been met with a huge sigh of relief from one punter in America.

With Argentina overwhelming favourites to beat the Iranians, one confident gambler in Las Vegas put down two bets which totalled US$350,000 that the Argentines would prevail against their Persian opposition.

The stake secured the punter US$30,000 but it looked for a very long time that they could have been looking at a substantial loss.

Imagine the stress of looking at those slips as the clock ticked to 90 minutes.