CELEBRITY
CRISIS NOT OVER AS UNHAPPY MESSI SKIPS TRAINING AGAIN
Lionel Messi’s grudging acceptance that he will have to stay put at Barcelona after losing his stand-off with club president Josep Maria Bartomeu has left the Argentinian superstar’s future still in doubt.
The 33-year-old, who was absent from training yesterday – the day after announcing that he would reluctantly stay at the club – launched a stinging attack on Bartomeu claiming that he had broken his word to let him leave.
The absence of any new contract means that even if Messi is not allowed to leave this summer, he could enter into negotiations with other teams from Jan 1 and leave for free when his current deal expires in July.
The feeling that his reluctant decision was by no means the end of the affair was clear in Spanish daily Marca’s headline: “Messi stays, the crisis too”.
Bartomeu could yet respond with his resignation, having previously indicated that he would step down if the player publicly said he was the problem and agreed to stay.
Messi revealed in an exclusive interview with Goal on Friday that he felt his initial decision to leave was in the best interests of the club. “I needed it, the club needed it and it was good for everyone,” he said.
Messi’s departure would have eased some of the club’s financial problems.
Despite Barca being the world’s richest club, according to the Deloitte Money League, players took a 70 per cent pay cut because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The club have a wage bill of €671 million (S$1.08 billion) in an era when their revenues have been hit by the lack of gate receipts and when new Dutch manager Ronald Koeman is trying to overhaul the squad.
Yet they will need to fork out €150 million gross for Messi to stay another year. He would also qualify to receive a loyalty bonus of €70 million.
Messi believed he had a clause in his contract that meant he could leave for free at the end of last season but Barca said that the option expired on June 10.
“The president always said that at the end of the season I could decide if I wanted to go or if I wanted to stay and in the end he didn’t end up keeping his word,” Messi told Goal.
According to Spanish football expert Guillem Balague, the soured relationship means Barca may have won a hollow battle but could lose the war.
“I’m not sure we have heard the end of this saga yet,” he wrote in his column for the BBC.
“Koeman and Barcelona are going to have to get used to working with a player who claims he has been deceived by the club president, a player who has made it abundantly clear he wants to leave, and a player who has openly stated he is unhappy.”
-AFP
Cristiano Ronaldo has become the first footballer to reach billionaire status, according to the latest Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which has valued the Portugal great’s net worth at an estimated $1.4 billion.
The 40-year-old striker’s financial ascent comes after he signed a new contract with Saudi side Al-Nassr in June reportedly worth more than $400 million.
Bloomberg said that Ronaldo earned more than $550 million in salary between 2002 and 2023, supplemented by a decade-long Nike deal worth nearly $18 million annually, and lucrative endorsements with Armani, Castrol and others that added more than $175 million to his fortune.
Ronaldo’s move to Al-Nassr from Manchester United in 2023 had already made him the highest-paid player in football history, with an annual salary of 177 million pounds ($237.52 million), plus bonuses and a reported 15% share in his Saudi Arabia club.
Argentina and Inter Miami forward Lionel Messi has earned more than $600 million in pre-tax salary during his career.
Ronaldo’s billionaire status places him among a rare group of athletes that includes basketball greats Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and LeBron James, golfer Tiger Woods and tennis player Roger Federer.
Ronaldo suggested he is not considering retirement any time soon.
“I still have a passion for this,” he said at the Portugal Football Globes gala on Tuesday. “My family says it’s time to quit and they ask me why I want to score 1000 goals if I’ve already scored 900-something. But I don’t think that way inside.
“I’m still producing good things, I’m helping my club and the national team. Why not continue? I am sure that when I finish I will leave full because I gave everything of myself. I know I don’t have many years left to play, but the few I have left, I have to enjoy them to the fullest.”
-Reuters
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Former England soccer captain David Beckham and actor Gary Oldman were knighted in King Charles’ annual birthday honours list on Saturday, while sculptor Antony Gormley was made a Companion of Honour.
Beckham, 50, joined Manchester United as a trainee in 1993, going on to make almost 400 appearances for the club where he won a string of titles and cups.
He subsequently played for Real Madrid, LA Galaxy, and Inter Milan, as well as captaining his country 58 times and making 115 appearances.
His marriage to fashion designer and former Spice Girl Victoria Beckham in 1999 cemented a celebrity status which went far beyond his sporting exploits.
Oldman, 67, started his career on the stage, where he was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, before rising to prominence in film. He won the best actor Oscar for playing Winston Churchill in the 2017 drama “Darkest Hour”.
He also had roles in the “Dark Knight Trilogy” and the “Harry Potter” movie series and more recently starred in the TV spy drama “Slow Horses”.
Other famous names receiving honours included damehoods for musical theatre star Elaine Paige, novelist Pat Barker and ceramics maker Emma Bridgewater.
Roger Daltrey, lead singer of rock band the Who and a patron of the Teenage Cancer Trust, received a knighthood for services to charity.
More than 1,200 people received honours for their achievements, with a particular focus on those who had given their time to public service, the government said.
King Charles’ official birthday will be celebrated with the annual “Trooping the Colour” military parade in London on Saturday. His actual birthday is on November 14
-Reuters
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One of three judges in Diego Maradona’s closely scrutinized homicide trial in Argentina resigned on Tuesday amid a scandal triggered by the alleged filming of an unauthorised documentary, bringing uncertainty to the future of legal proceedings.
The high-profile trial over the death of soccer star Maradona began on March 11 in the South American country where the World Cup winner is still revered.
-Reuters
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