{"id":343979,"date":"2026-06-20T11:38:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T11:38:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/343979\/"},"modified":"2026-06-20T11:38:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T11:38:15","slug":"lionel-messi-makes-an-appeal-before-dallas-world-cup-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/343979\/","title":{"rendered":"Lionel Messi makes an appeal before Dallas World Cup game"},"content":{"rendered":"

Soccer sensation Lionel Messi’s father is undergoing medical treatment for an undisclosed illness, and his family asked the media for \u201chumanity\u201d amid rumors about Jorge Messi’s health while his son competes at the FIFA World Cup<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The family did not specify the illness that the 68-year-old Jorge Messi is suffering from.<\/p>\n

\u201cJorge is going through a health situation,\u201d the Messi family said in a statement. \u201cHe is currently under medical observation, recovering and progressing favorably within his current condition.\u201d<\/p>\n

Messi and his Argentina team are set to take on Austria in a group stage match<\/a> at Dallas Stadium in Arlington at 12 pm Monday, June 22.<\/p>\n

The 38-year-old Messi said after Argentina’s 3-0 victory over Algeria<\/a> in the team’s opening World Cup match that he was going through a difficult personal situation. He was very emotional after scoring the first of his three goals, which allowed him to equal Miroslav Klose as the all-time leading scorer in World Cup history with 16 goals.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy tears after the first goal? I\u2019ve had some tough days. It wasn\u2019t related to soccer. And those feelings were because of that,\u201d Messi said. \u201cI thank my teammates, the coaching staff and the delegation for helping me.\u201d<\/p>\n

The family statement, released by Messi\u2019s media office, came on the same day that reports of Jorge Messi\u2019s death circulated in Argentina.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt times like these, we ask for responsibility, prudence and humanity,\u201d the family said. \u201cA person\u2019s health and the peace of mind of their loved ones should not be the subject of speculation or irresponsible media interest.\u201d<\/p>\n

The statement said any further developments would be communicated by the family.<\/p>\n

Jorge Messi played a key role in his third son\u2019s soccer career, acting as his agent and managing his business affairs off the field.<\/p>\n

He accompanied the young Messi to Barcelona in the early 2000s for a tryout at La Masia, the Spanish club\u2019s youth academy.<\/p>\n

His father also negotiated Messi’s contracts with Barcelona and then his transfers to Paris Saint-Germain and Inter Miami, while also managing his son\u2019s image rights and several investments in real estate, hotels and restaurants.<\/p>\n

In 2016, Messi and his father were convicted in Spain on tax evasion charges but avoided prison time because the sentence was less than two years.<\/p>\n

While Messi is with his teammates at Argentina’s base camp in Kansas City awaiting their second group match against Austria on Monday in Dallas, his family expressed their \u201csincere gratitude for the outpouring of affection, respect and concern received.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe request that the privacy and confidentiality of Jorge and his entire family be respected during this process,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Soccer sensation Lionel Messi’s father is undergoing medical treatment for an undisclosed illness, and his family asked the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":343837,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[6980,102,104,103,3663,18957,73993,122676,3692],"class_list":["post-343979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-celebrities","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news","tag-father","tag-fifa-world-cup","tag-lionel-messi","tag-messi","tag-world-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=343979"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343979\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/343837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=343979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=343979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=343979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}