MADRID: Lionel Messi’s spotless image as the world’s greatest footballer and a humble man has taken a stunning blow with accusations that he cheated on his taxes, the Spanish media said yesterday.
Newspapers reacted with shock to news that the Barcelona star and Argentina international has been accused of defrauding the Spanish tax authorities of more than four million euros ($5m, £3.4m).
“A symbol under suspicion,” blared the front page of the country’s biggest sports daily, Marca, saying in an editorial that he had cast doubt on his image as an exemplary sportsman.
“He has not been condemned, just accused, but the tax authority’s account of a supposed fraud is hair-raising,” the paper said yesterday.
Madrid-based daily El Mundo said the claim “smears his image” and if proven would be “extraordinarily serious” and should be doubly condemned because of the 25-year-old’s high income.
The four-time world Player of the Year and his father Jorge Horacio Messi have fiercely denied wrongdoing.
The Barcelona-based daily Sport cautioned that the player had not been found guilty and should not be tried by the media.
“Messi does not deserve the injustice of parallel trials,” the paper’s director Joan Vehils said in an opinion piece.
“Investigating him is fine but that he be condemned already without being given a chance to defend himself and without a trial is unacceptable.” REUTERS
