CELEBRITY
REVELATION: MESSI WAS CHELSEA-BOUND!
Lionel Messi may have come close to joining Manchester City this summer but it’s not the first time the Barcelona talisman has been on the verge of a move to the Premier League.
According to Sky in Italy’s Gianluca Di Marzio, the Argentine superstar was on the cusp of becoming a Chelsea player in 2014.
The fee would have been a world-record £225million transfer – Messi’s buyout clause at the time – with Messi, Blues owner Roman Abramovich and then-manager Jose Mourinho keen for the deal to go through. He would have also earned £50m per season plus 70 per cent of image rights had the move not collapsed.
In his latest book Grand Hotel Calciomercato, a diary of the untold stories of the transfer market, Di Marzio also claims that Real Madrid tried the same ploy in 2013 but they were quickly dismissed by Messi out of his loyalty to their eternal rivals Barca.
It is reported that contact between Messi and Chelsea first began in January 2014 as the former was in the midst of a tax fraud probe. Frustrated with the Spanish authorities he sought a new life in London with the lure of playing under Mourinho to boot.
After speaking with several intermediaries as well as former Barca team-mate Deco, now an agent – who also had played at Chelsea, a meeting was set up with Messi and Mourinho via a FaceTime call.
That reported encounter went well with Messi telling his camp afterwards ‘With Mourinho, for how he’s spoken to me, I can win whatever I want: he’s a winner, go ahead and close the deal.’
Later that summer, Chelsea did business with Barcelona in the shape of signing Cesc Fabregas. And Di Marizo reports that it was a chat with Fabregas during one July pre-season session that saw the move break down between Messi and the Stamford Bridge outfit.
It is claimed that after his initial work to make the move work, Deco was squeezed out of talks as Mourinho spoke directly to Messi himself. Fabregas warned Deco of the situation and the former Portugal playmaker duly went to ‘snitch’ to Messi’s father and agent Jorge.
Messi senior himself was angry at being excluded from negotiations with the personal terms already agreed by his son’s intermediaries.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, I swear,’ Messi reportedly told his father.
But it was too late and the potential mouthwatering deal was curtailed as he listened to his father and stayed at the Nou Camp. Still, it wasn’t that bad for Messi as Barcelona went on to win the Treble (La Liga, Copa del Rey and Champions League) as he himself scored 58 goals alongside 27 assists.
-Daily Mail
Former England soccer captain David Beckham and actor Gary Oldman were knighted in King Charles’ annual birthday honours list on Saturday, while sculptor Antony Gormley was made a Companion of Honour.
Beckham, 50, joined Manchester United as a trainee in 1993, going on to make almost 400 appearances for the club where he won a string of titles and cups.
He subsequently played for Real Madrid, LA Galaxy, and Inter Milan, as well as captaining his country 58 times and making 115 appearances.
His marriage to fashion designer and former Spice Girl Victoria Beckham in 1999 cemented a celebrity status which went far beyond his sporting exploits.
Oldman, 67, started his career on the stage, where he was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, before rising to prominence in film. He won the best actor Oscar for playing Winston Churchill in the 2017 drama “Darkest Hour”.
He also had roles in the “Dark Knight Trilogy” and the “Harry Potter” movie series and more recently starred in the TV spy drama “Slow Horses”.
Other famous names receiving honours included damehoods for musical theatre star Elaine Paige, novelist Pat Barker and ceramics maker Emma Bridgewater.
Roger Daltrey, lead singer of rock band the Who and a patron of the Teenage Cancer Trust, received a knighthood for services to charity.
More than 1,200 people received honours for their achievements, with a particular focus on those who had given their time to public service, the government said.
King Charles’ official birthday will be celebrated with the annual “Trooping the Colour” military parade in London on Saturday. His actual birthday is on November 14
-Reuters
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One of three judges in Diego Maradona’s closely scrutinized homicide trial in Argentina resigned on Tuesday amid a scandal triggered by the alleged filming of an unauthorised documentary, bringing uncertainty to the future of legal proceedings.
The high-profile trial over the death of soccer star Maradona began on March 11 in the South American country where the World Cup winner is still revered.
-Reuters
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For the third year in a row, and the fifth time overall, Cristiano Ronaldo is the world’s highest-paid athlete.
But at age 40, the Portuguese soccer superstar is reaching new highs.
Over the past 12 months, counting both his playing salary at Saudi Arabia’s Al-Nassr and his off-field business endeavors, Ronaldo collected an estimated $275 million before taxes and agent fees—the third-best year by an active athlete ever measured by Forbes.
On that all-time list, Ronaldo is surpassed only by boxer Floyd Mayweather, who earned $300 million in 2015 and $285 million in 2018.
And when it comes to the 2025 leaderboard, Ronaldo has a $119 million advantage over No. 2, Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry.
The League of Wealthy Sportsmen
The gap is especially impressive considering that Curry’s $156 million total is also a record for his sport, beating the NBA mark of $128.2 million set last year by LeBron James.
And there are plenty of other eye-popping paydays among this year’s 10 highest-paid athletes, starting with James, who notched a personal-best $133.8 million to land at No. 6. Meanwhile, Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott (No. 4, $137million) and New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto (No. 7, $114 million) broke records for the NFL and MLB.
Combined, the 10 highest-paid athletes brought in $1.4 billion, up slightly from last year’s $1.38 billion and the largest total since Forbes began ranking athlete earnings in 1990.
This year is also only the second time, after 2024, that every member of the top 10 made at least $100 million.
In fact, heavyweight boxing champion Oleksandr Usyk ($101 million) and golfer Jon Rahm ($100 million) reached the milestone, too, without managing to crack this list.
For the third year in a row, and the fifth time overall, Cristiano Ronaldo is the world’s highest-paid athlete.
But at age 40, the Portuguese soccer superstar is reaching new highs.
Over the past 12 months, counting both his playing salary at Saudi Arabia’s Al-Nassr and his off-field business endeavors, Ronaldo collected an estimated $275 million before taxes and agent fees—the third-best year by an active athlete ever measured by Forbes.
On that all-time list, Ronaldo is surpassed only by boxer Floyd Mayweather, who earned $300 million in 2015 and $285 million in 2018.
And when it comes to the 2025 leaderboard, Ronaldo has a $119 million advantage over No. 2, Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry.
The gap is especially impressive considering that Curry’s $156 million total is also a record for his sport, beating the NBA mark of $128.2 million set last year by LeBron James.
And there are plenty of other eye-popping paydays among this year’s 10 highest-paid athletes, starting with James, who notched a personal-best $133.8 million to land at No. 6. Meanwhile, Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott (No. 4, $137million) and New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto (No. 7, $114 million) broke records for the NFL and MLB.
Combined, the 10 highest-paid athletes brought in $1.4 billion, up slightly from last year’s $1.38 billion and the largest total since Forbes began ranking athlete earnings in 1990.
This year is also only the second time, after 2024, that every member of the top 10 made at least $100 million.
In fact, heavyweight boxing champion Oleksandr Usyk ($101 million) and golfer Jon Rahm ($100 million) reached the milestone, too, without managing to crack this list.
World’s Highest-Paid Athletes 2025
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