World Cup: Lionel Messi and the story of his supposedly dead father

Eduardo Biscayart, 56, is a terrific storyteller; many years as a football commentator for major sports broadcasters, most recently in the USA, have steeled him. He knows how to create suspense, when to use pauses or punchlines, and most importantly, he knows when something newsworthy is happening in front of his eyes. And so he knew he had a story to tell as he sat at a table at Jack Stack Barbecue in Kansas City on Thursday, surrounded by colleagues.

“Don Bisca”, as he is called here and there, is active as a photographer at the World Cup, and on Tuesday he was on duty at Argentina’s game against Algeria in the Kansas City Chiefs stadium – behind the Algerians’ goal, which was perforated three times by Lionel Messi. After the first of Messi’s three goals, he aimed his lens at him and saw his facial features enlarged through the zoom function. He followed him with the camera, and what he saw only made full sense a few days after Argentina’s 3-0 win. And so Bisca, as his friends really call him, with dramatically widened eyes that bore into the other person behind his glasses, told how Messi ran up to a TV camera, blew a kiss and said clearly: “Te amo, papá.” I love you, dad.

Even on Friday, Bisca was still surprised that this scene caused so few waves. On the other hand, the picture direction of the games is in the hands of Americans; That’s why you don’t have to assume that they know anything about Messi and/or his importance for football.

What they certainly couldn’t have known: that Messi had suffered on Tuesday at the thought of his beloved father. This in turn was captured by the cameras, which crave primary emotions: After the goal, tears rolled down Messi’s cheeks. After the game, he also admitted that he had been overwhelmed by his emotions over an issue that had nothing to do with sport, although he did not say what it was about.

This fact alone was remarkable enough. Not that you never saw Messi cry. When he had to leave FC Barcelona and join Paris Saint-Germain in 2021, he cried so much in public that it would have been enough for a dozen mourners. But the fact that he verbally expressed his private concerns was new. And it was described by one or two journalists in Argentina’s homeland as carte blanche decided to put out into the world all the rumors that had been on the tip of their tongues.

The version that Jorge Messi, the father, was seriously ill had been circulating around the country for weeks. At least that has now been officially confirmed, by Messi himself. Because when the moderators of the gossip shows began to outdo each other live in spreading rumors, and in the end a certain Florencia Peña on Luzu TV decided to declare Jorge Messi dead live, the family intervened. With a communiqué dripping with outrage. And the supposed death was denied.

However, the Messi family confirmed that “Jorge is currently in a difficult health situation.” An exact diagnosis was not reported. But: Messi Sr. is “under medical observation, recovering and developing positively in line with his health.” It is certain that he is in a clinic. Another gossip journalist named Ángel de Brito, citing a WhatsApp conversation with Messi’s mother Celia, reported that the whole fuss had made Jorge Messi uncomfortable. “What I did there…” he said. Worried about your son and his performance at the World Cup?

Argentina’s President Milei uses the opportunity to generally scold the media

It would be unfounded. One of the things Messi also said after the game against Algeria was a message of gratitude to the team and the delegation: “They were always there for me.” Perhaps he said that under the impression of coach Lionel Scaloni’s embrace: “Te quiero mucho”, I love you very much, he said, a real lip-reading word of honor. The affection was also palpable on Thursday when Messi went to training in Kansas.

How distant the days suddenly seem when Messi was so fed up that he even resigned from the national team – ten years ago to the day. But now he is in his biotope. “Perhaps he has found naturalness, a group of friends who are maximally concerned about his well-being and look at him sometimes as if he were God and then again as if he were a boy from the neighborhood,” coach Scaloni mused after the Algeria victory. Nobody doubts that he wants to and will continue playing.

He is more likely to want to satisfy the Argentine rock legend Indio Solari, who died a few weeks ago. “How about you win another World Cup. That’s what you’re there for, dude, that’s what you’re there for,” Indio Solari said in a publicly circulated voice message to Messi before his death. And who knows what the father, who once accompanied the 13-year-old talent to Barcelona, ​​became a caregiver and manager, and shared the dock with him in Barcelona when it came to tax offenses, asked him to do.

What will no longer exist: interference from Florencia Peña on Luzu TV. She tearfully apologized and explained that she had been told by the production team to explain that Messi’s father had died over the earpiece, which is known in industry parlance as “la cucaracha,” the cockroach. She was stoned in the Argentine media, her boss publicly pressured her to resign, and “all those responsible for the production team” were fired.

Argentina’s President Javier Milei also got involved. He took out the verbal chainsaw and used the spread of fake news by “a meaningless gossipmonger” to launch a fundamental attack on “the media” and “the newspapers,” which “never tire of smearing, slandering, or insulting everyone.” Messi himself should only be thinking about his father. And about defeating Austria in Dallas on Monday.