FC Barcelona Star, Lionel Messi Triumphs In Court

FC Barcelona superstar, Lionel Messi has won his court case in Spain in a libel suit he filed against a journalist that wrote an article against him in Spain.

According to ESPN,reports from Spain say that Messi has been awarded nearly €65,000 in damages in a libel action and he has donated the money to charity.

The case was taken after a Madrid-based journalist, Alfonso Ussia, wrote an article in La Razon after Messi’s Argentina lost to Germany in the 2014 World Cup final.
Ussia had criticised Messi’s form and made reference to the hormone treatment the forward received as a youngster by describing him as “Nandrolono.”

The Audiencia Provincial de Barcelona court found that the article went outside the bounds of an opinion piece and ruled that La Razon, its editor Francisco Marhuenda and Ussia must pay €64,590.79 to the player. The money is to be donated to the charity Doctors without Borders.

The judgment said the views expressed in the article are “unnecessary and impertinent for the exposition of the ideas or opinions that the journalist attempts to transmit in the article, and are objectively insulting and offensive bearing in mind the dimension of the player’s public image and the pluralism, tolerance and open spirit that should reign in a modern society.”

Messi left his home city of Rosario to join Barcelona aged 13 as the Catalan club were prepared to pay for the $900-a-month hormone treatment he needed to grow sufficiently to become a professional player.