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Messi Presented with Inaugural MARCA America Award

Messi Presented with Inaugural MARCA America Award
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Messi Presented with Inaugural MARCA America Award

Messi Presented with Inaugural MARCA America Award

Inter Miami's Lionel Messi added another award to his collection on Thursday.

Messi became the first recipient of the MARCA America Award, presented by the Spain-based media company, The Associated Press reported. The award recognizes Messi’s championship-laden career — one with a record 46 trophies won for club or country, and at least 56 other awards on the individual level.
“It has been quite the journey,” the Argentine superstar said in Spanish during a moderated question-and-answer session at Chase Stadium, Inter Miami's home field. “We have experienced so many beautiful things but also complicated moments. In 20 years not everything is beautiful. You cannot win all the time."
For Messi, no title outshines the 2022 World Cup with Argentina that helped cement his legacy among the sport’s greatest players. However, the 37-year-old Messi has won plenty and still feels the drive to continue adding titles. Similar to his titles with Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain, Messi already has helped Inter Miami win hardware since he joined the MLS club in July 2023.
Although limited to 18 MLS matches this season because of an ankle injury and national team commitments, Messi has 17 goals and 15 assists to help lead Miami to the 2024 Supporters Shield. Miami will have home-field advantage throughout the MLS Cup playoffs which begin next week.
“I was able to achieve the biggest prize, which is the World Cup,” said Messi, who had three goals and two assists in a 6-0 Argentina romp past Bolivia in a World Cup qualifier on Tuesday. “It is the trophy all of us want when we start playing and I managed to fulfill my dream. We won many titles in Barcelona, Paris. Now we are here with the objective to fight hard for another title.”
Messi’s contract with Inter Miami runs through next season. And, after his recent goal-scoring performance on Tuesday, Messi could remain energized in his commitments with Argentina through the next World Cup cycle.
“I still have a deep love for this sport and I will continue to aspire to win more titles,” Messi said. “At this level, you have to enjoy things day by day.”
Inter Miami has one regular-season match left, coming at home Saturday against New England. If Inter Miami wins it would set the MLS single-season points mark with 72, one more than New England had in 2021.

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Mbappe's Golden-boy Image Takes A Hit Amid Negative Headlines

Mbappe in action for France last month - AFP
Mbappe in action for France last month - AFP
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Mbappe's Golden-boy Image Takes A Hit Amid Negative Headlines

Mbappe in action for France last month - AFP
Mbappe in action for France last month - AFP

Kylian Mbappe is hoping his recent move to Real Madrid will take his already glittering career on the pitch to new heights, but the French superstar has become embroiled in off-field difficulties in recent months.

In an ideal world, the 25-year-old former Paris Saint-Germain striker would have been able to focus fully on settling in Madrid after he moved to the Spanish capital on a five-year deal during the summer just finished.

Instead, as well as being hampered by fitness problems, Mbappe has been locked in a bitter financial dispute with his old club and is now cited as the suspect in a rape investigation according to reports in Sweden, according to AFP.

Mbappe has dismissed those reports as "fake news" and is hoping to win his battle with PSG over what he claims amounts to 55 million euros ($60m) in unpaid wages and bonuses from last season.

Nevertheless, the negative headlines are a blow to the player's image and remove some of the aura around a young man who has become an icon in his home country and is a global sporting superstar.

When Mbappe emerged as a teenager at Monaco almost a decade ago, he stood out because of his precocious talent but also thanks to his remarkable communication skills.

Rather than being fazed by the media spotlight, Mbappe was clearly at ease in front of the cameras and spoke with the maturity and assurance of someone considerably older.

He was a World Cup winner at 19 and went on to become the all-time top scorer at PSG, the local club of the boy from Bondy in the Paris suburbs.

In March 2023, a few months after scoring a stunning hat-trick in France's World Cup final defeat by Lionel Messi's Argentina, he was named captain of the national team by coach Didier Deschamps.

That seemed a natural choice given his status in the team and in the country in general, but his position as skipper meant the decision to rest him for France's UEFA Nations League matches this month was controversial.

Mbappe had picked up a thigh injury in late September, a minor problem but one that suggested giving him a break would be beneficial in the long run.

"We need to put the player's interests first, without putting him into difficulty," Deschamps said of that decision, referring to Mbappe's relationship with his new club.

But as France's sporting press debated whether Mbappe's temporary absence from the squad was justified or a sign of a lack of commitment to the French cause, the player himself travelled to Stockholm for a short break with members of his entourage.

Swedish newspapers Aftonbladet and Expressen, and public broadcaster SVT, have since reported that he is under investigation for rape, after an alleged incident in a hotel on October 10.

A Swedish prosecutor confirmed on Tuesday that a rape investigation had been opened but did not mention Mbappe's name.

Meanwhile Mbappe, whose career is managed by his mother Fayza Lamari, has taken his financial row with PSG to a French league committee.

He is trying to recover 55 million euros comprised of several months' unpaid wages and a signing-on fee, money PSG claimed he agreed to waive if he departed for free at the end of last season.

Mbappe even intimated on Monday that there was a link between the rape report and the wrangle with his old team, where he spent seven years.

"It's becoming so predictable, on the eve of the hearing, as if by chance," he wrote on X on Monday.

His unhappy divorce from PSG, which saw him left out of the team on numerous occasions in the second half of last season after he announced his intention to leave, surely contributed to a disappointing European Championship with France.

Mbappe suffered a broken nose in France's opening game at Euro 2024 in June and only scored one goal, a penalty in a group-stage draw with Poland, before Les Bleus lost in the semi-finals.

He looked some way short of peak physical form and is taking his time to settle in Madrid, even if he has seven goals in his first 11 appearances.

One recent moment seemed to capture the change in attitude towards Mbappe in his home country, as he was loudly booed by Lille supporters when introduced as a substitute for Real in a Champions League game earlier this month.

Such a welcome for an opposition player may not be unusual, but it contrasted sharply with the acclaim with which he was received around France in the aftermath of the last World Cup.