{"id":572630,"date":"2020-11-19T09:46:12","date_gmt":"2020-11-19T14:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/?p=572630"},"modified":"2020-11-19T09:46:12","modified_gmt":"2020-11-19T14:46:12","slug":"lionel-messi-im-tired-of-always-being-the-problem-at-barcelona","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2020\/11\/19\/lionel-messi-im-tired-of-always-being-the-problem-at-barcelona\/","title":{"rendered":"Lionel Messi: ‘I’m Tired of Always Being The Problem at Barcelona’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lionel Messi<\/a> has said he is ‘tired of always being the problem’ at Barcelona<\/a> – in response to claims that he holds a ‘regime of terror’ at the club from Antoine Griezmann<\/a>‘s former agent.<\/p>\n

Messi Hits Back at Eric Olhats – Who Claimed Argentine’s Attitude Towards Griezmann at Barcelona Was ‘Deplorable’<\/h2>\n

Messi Was Confronted By Reporters Upon Return to Barcelona From International Duty<\/h3>\n

Speaking on his return to Barcelona, having been away with Argentina on international duty, Messi told Spanish media:\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

“The truth is that I’m a little tired of always being the problem for everything at the club.<\/p>\n

“On top of that, after a 15-hour flight, I had the tax authorities waiting for me. It’s madness.”<\/p>\n

Olhats: ‘It is a Regime of Terror’<\/h2>\n

Messi’s comments\u00a0come after Eric Olhats – Griezmann’s former agent and mentor – told France Football<\/a> that Messi’s influence at Barcelona had made it difficult for Griezmann to settle at the club:<\/a><\/p>\n

“Antoine arrived at a club with serious problems where Messi controls everything. He is both emperor and monarch and wasn’t happy with Antoine’s arrival.<\/p>\n

“His attitude has been deplorable, it has made him feel [displeasure]. I have always heard Antoine say that he had no problems with Messi, but never the other way around.<\/p>\n

“It is the regime of terror. Either you are with him, or you are against him.”<\/p>\n

The episode is the latest installment in the saga surrounding Messi’s future at Barcelona.<\/p>\n

The Argentine icon had tried to leave the club for free during the summer transfer window. However, he ended up staying at the Camp Nou<\/a>, after La Liga ruled his release clause of \u00a3700m had to be paid.<\/p>\n

Messi’s decision to stay for another year avoided a legal battle with the club.<\/p>\n

Tax Issues Continue to Dog Messi<\/h2>\n

Messi’s latest run-in with the tax authorities follows a long line of disputes over how much money he should be paying to the Spanish government.<\/p>\n

In 2016, he was given a 21-month prison sentence as well as a fine of 2m euros (\u00a31.8m) for defrauding the Spanish government of 4.2m euros over income earned from image rights.<\/p>\n

Messi was allowed to exchange his sentence for a 250,000 euros fin instead – Spanish law allows defendants without a previous conviction to serve any sentence of under two years on probation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Main Photo:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Lionel Messi has said he is ‘tired of always being the problem’ at Barcelona – in response to claims that he holds a ‘regime of terror’ at the club from Antoine Griezmann‘s former agent. Messi Hits Back at Eric Olhats – Who Claimed Argentine’s Attitude Towards Griezmann at Barcelona Was ‘Deplorable’ Messi Was Confronted By […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3590,"featured_media":572633,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1365,6],"tags":[336,464,501,142,41,136],"class_list":["post-572630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-barcelona","category-la-liga","tag-antoine-griezmann","tag-barcelona","tag-camp-nou","tag-la-liga","tag-lionel-messi","tag-world-football"],"modified_by":"Fraser Bernstein","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3590"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/572633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}