Lionel Messi’s brother, Matias Messi, has issued an apology days after taking a jibe at Barcelona, where he claimed that no one knew the team before the Argentina captain played for them.
Matias was answering questions from fans on his son’s Twitch account where he went on to say: “I have a SPORT clip that says ‘Messi should return to Barcelona’ and I said “hahahaha, we are not going back to Barcelona, and if we do, we are going to do a good cleaning. Among them, kick out Joan Laporta.”
“People [in Barcelona] did not support him. They should have gone out for a protest or something, Let Laporta leave and Messi stay. The Spanish are traitors. I’m telling this because I want it to come out of our guts,” he added, criticising the Barcelona fanbase.
Following his remark, Matias has been heavily criticised which has led to him finally issuing a formal apology. Writing on his social media platform, he wrote,
“I want to apologize for what I said on social media, I was just joking with my son and friends. How can I think like that about a club as great as Barcelona, which has given so much to my family and Leo. I want to say sorry to everyone, specifically to all Barcelona fans.”
As it turns out, ESPN reached out to Lionel Messi’s representatives over Matias’ comments, but they have distanced themselves from everything.
“They are exclusively the individual and personal opinion of Matías, which does not have to be or coincide with that of Leo or that of other relatives, friends or people close to him,” read the statement.
