CELEBRITY
Guardiola and Messi meet again as PSG play Man City in Champions League
There was a time when a reunion between Lionel Messi and Pep Guardiola looked distinctly possible, but on Tuesday (Sept 28) they will be on opposite sides again when Paris Saint-Germain play Manchester City in the Champions League.
Had it not been for Jack Grealish, perhaps things would have turned out differently.
City announced the £100 million signing of Grealish from Aston Villa on August 5, the same day Barcelona revealed Messi would not be staying at the Camp Nou.
A year ago, when Messi tried to force his departure from Catalonia, City appeared the most likely destination.
In the end Barcelona prevented the six-time Ballon d’Or winner from leaving then and 12 months later Messi was prepared to stay put until it became clear the financial mess at the Camp Nou meant he could not.
If City had anticipated Messi becoming available, they might have moved for him. But instead they focused their sights on Grealish and were trying to sign Harry Kane, a move that ultimately didn’t happen.
“Right now it is not in our thoughts,” Guardiola said when asked if City might move for Messi.
It says much about the modern game that PSG were the only other realistic destination for the 34-year-old whom Guardiola has described as the greatest player of all time.
Messi has played just three games for his new club and is yet to score. He has sat out PSG’s last two matches with a knee problem but the feeling is that Mauricio Pochettino has been saving him for City.
After being held 1-1 by Club Brugge in their opening game, PSG need a positive result against City to stop their rivals taking control of their Champions League group.
Messi will fancy opening his account in Paris on such an occasion, and Guardiola has already been on the receiving end of the Argentine’s genius in Europe.
After Guardiola left Barcelona in 2012 at the end of four glorious years in which he oversaw Messi’s transition from superstar in the making to the best in the world, he faced his old club for the first time in the Champions League semi-finals in 2015.
Barcelona beat Guardiola’s Bayern 5-3 on aggregate on the way to winning the trophy. Messi produced a sublime performance to score two late goals in a 3-0 first-leg win at the Camp Nou that effectively killed the tie.
The only other time the duo have come up against each other was in the group stage in 2016, just after Guardiola arrived at City.
Messi scored a hat-trick as Barca won 4-0 at the Camp Nou and he then put his side ahead in Manchester, but City won 3-1.
This time the expectation is both City and PSG will progress from their group and both men are desperate to win the Champions League again – the last of Messi’s four titles came in 2015, while Guardiola has not lifted the trophy since Messi inspired Barcelona to a 3-1 win over Manchester United in the 2011 final.
While the world waits to see how Messi’s move to Paris turns out, Guardiola continues to regret the absence of a prolific centre-forward as the final piece of his jigsaw at City.
That was evident on Saturday when, for all their chances, they were restricted to a single goal by Gabriel Jesus to a 1-0 win at Chelsea.
Prior to that Guardiola had spoken of his regret at City’s lack of a “weapon” up front.
“The club needs in the next years a striker. When it’s not possible, it’s not possible, we move on with the fantastic squad we have,” he said.
PSG, of course, have more than one such player. Kylian Mbappe has been the top scorer in France in each of the last three seasons.
Messi left Barcelona as their all-time top scorer with 672 goals in 778 appearances.
His peak at the Camp Nou came in Guardiola’s final season there, in 2011-12, when he scored an incredible 73 goals.
Nobody knows Messi’s game better than Guardiola, but nobody knows better than Pep that there is no stopping Messi when he is at the top of his game.
-AFP
Cristiano Ronaldo has become the first footballer to reach billionaire status, according to the latest Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which has valued the Portugal great’s net worth at an estimated $1.4 billion.
The 40-year-old striker’s financial ascent comes after he signed a new contract with Saudi side Al-Nassr in June reportedly worth more than $400 million.
Bloomberg said that Ronaldo earned more than $550 million in salary between 2002 and 2023, supplemented by a decade-long Nike deal worth nearly $18 million annually, and lucrative endorsements with Armani, Castrol and others that added more than $175 million to his fortune.
Ronaldo’s move to Al-Nassr from Manchester United in 2023 had already made him the highest-paid player in football history, with an annual salary of 177 million pounds ($237.52 million), plus bonuses and a reported 15% share in his Saudi Arabia club.
Argentina and Inter Miami forward Lionel Messi has earned more than $600 million in pre-tax salary during his career.
Ronaldo’s billionaire status places him among a rare group of athletes that includes basketball greats Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and LeBron James, golfer Tiger Woods and tennis player Roger Federer.
Ronaldo suggested he is not considering retirement any time soon.
“I still have a passion for this,” he said at the Portugal Football Globes gala on Tuesday. “My family says it’s time to quit and they ask me why I want to score 1000 goals if I’ve already scored 900-something. But I don’t think that way inside.
“I’m still producing good things, I’m helping my club and the national team. Why not continue? I am sure that when I finish I will leave full because I gave everything of myself. I know I don’t have many years left to play, but the few I have left, I have to enjoy them to the fullest.”
-Reuters
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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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