Soccer world champion Lionel Messi was insulted in internal news during his time at FC Barcelona, according to a report in the Catalan newspaper “El Periódico”. The police in Barcelona confirmed that there were investigations into this, but refused to give details when asked. “We basically do not share anything about ongoing investigations,” said a spokesman for the German Press Agency on Friday.
The background to the affair, which Spanish newspapers refer to as “Barçagate”, is likely to be the dispute over cuts in player salaries from the heavily indebted club at the beginning of the corona pandemic. “El Periódico” and also the Spanish news agency Europa Press reported, citing an internal report by the police, that an ex-board member of FC Barcelona had spoken in the chat messages with bad words, among other things, about the comparatively small height of the Argentine superstar and his treatment Growth hormones left out in childhood and adolescence.
In addition, the ex-board member suggested making Messi’s contract public, as well as Gerard Piqué’s, to make them look bad in public. In fact, in January 2021, Spanish newspaper El Mundo published an agreement for a salary of just over €555m over four years, which they described as Messi’s contract with the Catalans. After his contract expired in June 2021, there was no new agreement. Messi joined Paris St. Germain after 21 years at Barcelona. Messi’s reaction to the reports was not initially known.
