2023-12-26 23:32:02
BUENOS AIRES (AP) — “That’s it, that’s it.” Moments following the consecration of Argentina as world champion, star Lionel Messi repeated the phrase several times, looking at his family located in one of the boxes at the Lusail stadium in Qatar, while moving his hands from one side to the other to reaffirm it. .
On December 18, 2022, Messi settled his only pending score with football. Since then, the eight-time Ballon d’Or winner lowered his self-demand and prioritized being a family man, which he put off so many times to remain the best footballer in the world.
“I wanted to say that it was over, that it was over following so much time and so much suffering, because there were times where I suffered a lot with the national team, many disappointments, with lost finals,” he recalled in an interview earlier this year. He was alluding to the string of lost finals with his country’s team, a streak that was ended with the Copa América won a year before the World Cup.
“I had received a lot of criticism of all colors and I know that my family suffered just as much as me or more. Unfair things were said towards me that went beyond football and that’s really what bothered me, it hurt me. (In Qatar) it was like closing the circle. “There is nothing left,” she said.
In July, Messi left Europe’s elite soccer to move to Inter Miami of the MLS, a league with enormous potential, but less physical demand, just when at 36 years old he was contemplating retirement.
In his first season, the Argentine scored 11 goals and provided eight assists in 14 games in all competitions. He helped the team lift its first trophy in the inaugural edition of the League’s Cup organized in conjunction with the Mexican league.
Sales of pink No. 10 jerseys skyrocketed, subscriptions for the league’s games on Apple TV increased, and ticket prices for its games reached unprecedented levels.
“I think history will see 2023 as the year of Messi, but from my perspective, it was perhaps the most spectacular year in our history, for several reasons, and Lionel Messi took it to a level that was probably difficult to imagine,” he said. commissioner Don Garber during a recent interview regarding the state of the league.
Outside of the playing fields, you can see an unprecedented version of Messi, who until his arrival in the United States was very jealous of his privacy. Now it is common to see him in the training sessions of his three children at the Inter Miami soccer academy. And he shares nights out with his wife Antonella and his friends.
“I try to spend as much time with them, enjoy it and live a normal day to day life, like any parent. I missed a lot of things, a lot of trips, concentrations, games,” he reflected in a recent interview for the Apple TV documentary “Messi meets America.”
“Although I still give it the same importance and I still have the same desire, defeats and difficult moments are experienced differently,” he added.
Pep Guardiola, who coached Messi in the best Barcelona in history, said that he might never take him off the field because he got angry.
The post-World Cup version of Messi is that of a footballer aware that he no longer has the physique of a twenty-year-old and that he prefers to stop in time rather than get injured.
The captain and all-time top scorer of the Albiceleste with 106 goals, asked for a change in the debut once morest Ecuador due to a muscle discomfort and did not play a minute in the next game once morest Bolivia in September at the start of the qualifiers for the 2026 World Cup.
“I was a little tired and it happened like that. Surely it will not be the last time that he starts appearing in games,” he expressed then.
He reappeared the next day in the second half once morest Paraguay and just completed the 90 minutes once morest Peru, with two goals included.
While on the other side of the Atlantic, Kylian Mbappé, Erling Haaland and Vinicius Jr are in the race to succeed him, Messi is already in his native Rosario to spend the end-of-year holidays with his loved ones before starting the first formal preseason since he arrived. to Inter Miami.
Next year’s league and Copa América in the United States are on the horizon.
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