Mohamed spoke to Olé where he commented on his talk with Leo Messi following the conclusion of the 2016 Copa América.

After much soul searching, disappointments and bitter nights, Leo Messi managed to touch the sky with Argentina in 2021 with the Copa América and the World Cup the following year.

However, the journey the number ‘10′ has had with the Albiceleste was filled with tough battles against the press and the Argentine people themselves, culminating in his momentary retirement after the 2016 Copa América, the centenary edition of the tournament. Antonio Mohamed, a television commentator at the time, commented in an interview on his clash with Messi after the final against Juan Antonio Pizzi’s Chile.

Messi’s journey to becoming a legend

“I want to clarify that I did not know that five seconds ago he had resigned from the National Team, I was not aware of it”, began ‘El Turco’ for Olé. “I hugged him before I knew. I was listening to him crying and Messi was telling me: ‘It’s not for me, it’s not for me’. I don’t remember what I said to him, what I really answered him. He was like a child, crying on my shoulder for 25 seconds,” recalled the former Celta and Pumas manager.

At that time, as incredible as it seems nowadays, Messi was far from becoming a living legend in Argentina. The former FC Barcelona player was living his best life in Barcelona and a nightmare in his native country. While in Europe he won everything, in South America he fell at the final hurdle on three separate occasions, all in a row.

The first of the trio of defeats came in 2014 as his Argentina side finished as runners-up in the Brazil World Cup, with a last-minute Mario Götze goal sealing their fate. In 2015 in the Copa América final was lost to Chile, and again in the Copa América Centenario, just a year later.

The latter ended up seeing the world react to the retirement of the ‘10′ with Argentina at only 28 years of age. Criticism in his country was such that it ended up sinking him, as did the awareness that Tata Martino was set to leave the role as team boss.

Messi would again taste the taste of failure with the La Albiceleste in Russia 2018 and the Copa América in 2019. In the new decade his situation took a radical turn, first with the Copa America 2021 and later with the Qatar 2022 World Cup, cementing his status as a living legend once and for all, not just in the country of his birth but the rest of the globe.