Leo Messi has chosen Castelldefels to open the first European establishment of El Club de la Milanesa, an Argentine food restaurant chain. The footballer is one of the main partners of the franchise, which has over 70 locations in Argentina, Uruguay, and the United States. The company wants to make the international leap and expand beyond America. Its objective is to open two more locations in Barcelona and five in total in Catalonia during the first years of activity. The exact location and opening date of the Castelldefels establishment are unknown, but the company intends to open the restaurant before the end of the year.

Women's football continues to take steps forward. Despite the flight of talent to England, Catalan football is consolidating its commitment to continue growing. The latest major project to arrive has been in Cornellà. Through Leo Messi –who announced the purchase of the Baix Llobregat club three months ago–, UE Cornellà SAD will debut a women's team this coming season, the first in its history. "It is an honor that we are counted on for this project. For the club it is a very important step and we know we have a responsibility," Amara, who will be captain at just nineteen years old, explains to ARA. "It was an honor that they counted on me for this role. Furthermore, they are giving me a lot of confidence and I am very grateful," she adds.

Leo Messi has bid farewell to his father, Jorge, who died a few days ago due to a serious illness, with a very emotional letter in which he reviews the relationship they had since childhood, the role he played in his career, and the last moments shared. In the text, the ex-Barça player particularly recalls the World Cup, which his father could not attend due to the worsening of his health, and leaves doubts about whether he will continue playing much longer. He has just turned 39 and has a contract with Inter Miami.

Footballer Lionel Messi said goodbye this Sunday to his father, Jorge Messi, who died on Friday at the age of 68. The funeral took place at the private cemetery El Prado, located on the outskirts of the Argentine city of Rosario, and consisted of an intimate ceremony surrounded by a security operation. Messi arrived in Rosario on Saturday night on a private plane, accompanied by his wife Antonela Roccuzzo and their children. Since Saturday midday, the El Prado cemetery had been closed to visitors to ensure the family's privacy. Leo Messi's brothers, Matías Rodrigo and María Sol, and his mother, Celia Cuccittini, were present at the wake and funeral. The family, in fact, tried to preserve privacy at all times and did not make any public statements about the patriarch's death.

Jorge Messi, Lionel Messi's father, died on Friday night at the age of 68 in a medical clinic in Rosario, the Argentine star's hometown, due to complications in his health condition stemming from a serious illness. The news was made public by the Argentine news portal Infobae, as well as by the press in the Rosario region, and has been confirmed by ARA. Condolences, including from Barça, have been pouring in throughout the day.

Barça was not really aware of having a problem with Leo Messi until May 2021. Joan Laporta had returned to the blaugrana presidency a couple of months earlier and the leader's main objective was to renew the contract of the Rosario forward, which expired at the end of that season. "This is dragging on and it's not good news," predicted one of the president's most trusted people at the time. He was absolutely right. The negotiations with Messi to find an alternative contract, the talks with La Liga to achieve fair play, the failed agreement with CVC, the internal pressures from guarantors who did not see a stratospheric renewal clearly... It was a sum of many things that imploded on that fateful Thursday, August 5th. It has been five years since Barça officially announced that Messi would not continue as blaugrana.

Spain is once again world champion of football. Here are some fundamental ideas about this second title.I said everywhere that Spain was the favorite against Argentina, because the Spanish team has better players who do what they have to do very well and interpret it with intelligence at every moment. If France in the semifinals and Argentina in the final have seemed like minor teams it is because Spain has subjected them with authority. Argentina, on the other hand, has lived each match with a religious tachycardia, doing its homework at the last minute, all hanging by a thread over the abyss, where God, Maradona, the Falklands and Messi are mixed. Messi alone (and even less so at 39 years old) cannot lift a national team that yesterday only shot at goal once in 120 minutes and could not make three consecutive passes. This is due to Spain's great defensive work, which has only conceded one goal in the entire championship, where Pau Cubarsí has graduated in this World Cup, as has Dani Olmo, with a Lamine who scares opponents but who has not fully exploded yet in this World Cup (although winning one at 19 years old is very similar to exploding). He has already won a European Championship and a World Cup with Spain. Now it's time for the Champions League with Barça. Show Time: Lamentable halftime show, with wasted talents like that of director Gustavo Dudamel, with appearances that caused suffering, like those of Madonna, Ronaldinho and Ronaldo. The World Cup song, performed by Shakira, has not hooked at all. A 27-minute break at halftime is not football. Infantino rules, Donald Trump's pawn.International politics: Donald Trump wanted to stay with the players when they were going to lift the championship trophy, because it is known that he always wins. In the box he was surrounded by leaders of countries he has insulted and belittled, such as Canada, Mexico and Spain. Spanish politics: National football teams are the ultimate expression of politics, and that's why the Spanish royal family and Pedro Sánchez and three ministers were there yesterday. With the World Cup victory, Pedro Sánchez ensures he reaches September with some oxygen. Yesterday, a Valencian socialist tweeted provocatively: "The Roja won. We reds won," written on July 19th, 90 years after the start of the Civil War. The World Cup will not ease the judges' pressure on cases affecting Sánchez, but people will be busy with other things until September. And in the autumn is when he can announce the call for elections.Catalonia: Thousands of people took to the streets of our country yesterday to celebrate Spain's victory.Horns and firecrackers were heard. The fact that Spain prohibits Catalonia's participation in international competitions is a very strong blow to the normalization of Catalan popular identity, especially for young people, for whom Spain is what is normal. Imagine the opportunity cost of Lamine Yamal not being able to wear the Catalonia jersey. And yet, national team and Spanish sentiment are not direct communicating vessels. Tell me, if not, how many Catalans do you not know who supported Spain because of the Barça players or, simply, because it is the closest national team.We will eat the red [team] for a few days. A red [team] that cannot be explained without Barça (not as much as in 2010, it's true), but where the style taught at La Masia is that of the national team and where eight Catalan players have gone to offer new glories to Spain. And the offering has been pure gold. Good morning.

Rivers of ink have flowed these days over a photograph that came to light two summers ago, on the occasion of the fascinating emergence, at just 16 years old, of Lamine Yamal in a major international tournament: a European Championship that the Spanish team ended up winning in England. The current impact, on the eve of a World Cup final, surpasses the initial one. In fact, there are even skeptics who suggest, in the midst of the explosion of artificial intelligence, that the image in question is a fake.

Football, the king of sports and a global business, has the professional sporting aspect and the political identity aspect. It moves a lot of money, large masses of fans, and many illusions. The passion for a club has a strong component of emotional adhesion. Support for a national team also does, with the added political layer. Football awakens passions and sublimes wars: better a competition between young people on the field than a life-or-death clash between soldiers. Hopefully, Ukraine and Russia - or Israel and Palestine - would compete in stadiums with a ball instead of doing so from the trenches with deadly weapons.

The fact that Catalan football is so recognizable in the call-ups, lineups, and playing style of the Spanish national team has made our absence from the World Cup with the Catalan team even harder. What a great role we would have played (as also happens in the Olympic Games), and instead, on Sunday we will once again offer new footballing glories to Spain, which, if you ask me for a prediction, I believe will be golden glories.Argentina has Messi, which is the best thing that could have happened to them, because he brings intelligence, technique, and composure to the emotional chaos of an Argentina that has played every match arriving late and desperately, as if they had a date with destiny rather than with their opponent, and those in charge of letting it pass couldn't find their name on the list of qualifiers, until finally they discover that victory was written. And where Scaloni's tactics don't reach, the supernatural reinforcements of God begin, the hand of God and his footballing son on Earth, Diego Armando Maradona, accompanied by Victor Hugo Morales' narration "¿de qué planeta viniste?”. Messi, moreover, brings a purpose to an entire team that loves him, which is to help him expand his legend and make him world champion again and a contender for a ninth Ballon d'Or, at 39 years old.And, after all, if anyone can bring Argentina down from this religious madness with which they have reached the final, it is Spain, with their rational, solid, and knowledgeable football, where everyone knows what they have to do and does it like champions. The World Cup of Cubarsí and Olmo has been impressive. The whole world has once again looked at the photo by Joan Monfort and Oriol Canals for Sport" with Lamine Yamal in the little tub, where Messi seems to be imposing his hands on him. It is the triumph of La Masia, from which the two stars of the championship have emerged. We already have this, and it is a lot.

The president of Argentina, Javier Milei, will not attend the final live in New York due to superstition. He has confirmed that so far he has watched all the World Cup matches at Las Oliveras (his presidential residence) with his sister and that he will continue to do so. When I read the news, I remembered an acquaintance from the neighborhood, a very nice guy who has an old dog named Lola, and who last Wednesday before the semi-final match against England, and in the middle of the heatwave, they were walking at noon with the Argentina jersey on, him and the dog. When I commented that poor Lola, that she was roasting, he said: “It’s for superstition.” “Ah, okay! Then I won’t say anything,” I replied.

Spain-Argentina in the World Cup final. The world will stop this Sunday with a historic match between Lamine Yamal and Leo Messi, two football stars forged at La Masia who are 20 years apart. There is no better spectacle to stage a generational handover. The albiceleste achieved another feat in a semifinal resolved agonizingly against England, who saw themselves overturned in just six minutes, a victim of the inexhaustible talent of Rosario's number 10, author of two key passes amidst another ode to epic (1-2). The British, despite their goalkeeper's good performance, managed the lead disastrously in a very exciting second half and were eliminated against the team with the most mystique on the planet.

Argentina will play the World Cup semi-finals thanks to Julián Álvarez. He hadn't scored in the entire tournament and was dealing with some murmurs about his rather mediocre performance, but he showed up at the best moment to save his team in another match decided by delirium (3-1). Sought after by big European clubs like Barça, the Atlético de Madrid forward invented a championship goal to unbalance a match that was heading for penalties. A rocket into the top corner from a brave Swiss team to meet England's Kane and Bellingham in the semis this Wednesday.

From the 2022 World Cup is common to see on social media that Argentine players share photos and videos of their roasted with the national team. Fans follow them wherever they are: in Qatar, at the Ezeiza fields – where the internationals train in Argentina – or in the United States. "It has become a ritual. They usually do it 48 hours before matches. The players, the technical staff, and the rest of thestaff technician. The grid is always handled by Diego Iacovone," says Bruno González, an Argentine journalist.

Leo Messi's Argentina came from behind against Egypt in a match marked by refereeing decisions. The North Africans have bitterly complained about François Letexier's performance and went so far as to claim that the match was "fixed" and that they had suffered "a great injustice." A duel full of controversies, almost all of which favored the current world champions.

There is a play that Leo Messi likes very much. While his team attacks down the left and the winger on duty reaches the byline, the center forward goes to the six-yard box to look for the finish. The defenders, normally, follow him. And while all this is happening, discreetly but totally intentionally, Leo Messi appears at the half-moon. The pass goes to him, of course. Like lightning, he loads his leg and finishes with power and precision. The shot, always with his left leg, has a bit of curl, enough to finally mislead and surprise everyone, from the defenders to the goalkeeper. It's a goal he's scored about two hundred times. Or more. But he keeps doing it. And he will continue to do it. A goal that had a double prize. It served him to open the scoring against Austria and become the top scorer in World Cup history. A decisive goal in Argentina's victory, which he would seal with a second goal in stoppage time to leave his team as first in group J, already qualified for the round of 32 (2-0).

Leo Messi's family confirmed this Thursday that Jorge Messi, the Argentine footballer's father, has been admitted to the hospital for a health problem about which no details have been disclosed. In a statement, the family environment indicated that he is "under medical supervision, recovering and evolving favorably within the framework he presents," the family said.

Three cries in the early morning woke many residents in Catalonia. They were Argentinians living here or Catalans who miss Messi. The former Barça player debuted on Wednesday morning in Kansas City in his sixth World Cup. He did so exactly on the day that marked 20 years since his first match in a World Cup, a distant 2006 in Germany. Messi entered the field defending the crown won four years ago in Qatar, when he finally became champion. The Argentinians faced Algeria in a test that was supposed to allow an understanding of their level of play, after playing few high-level friendlies in recent months. And they passed the test with flying colors thanks to three goals from their captain. There were people who said he shouldn't be a starter because he's already a veteran. Others said he lives permanently on vacation in Miami. In reality, Messi is eternal and scored the three goals for the albiceleste. He even scored a fourth goal that didn't make it onto the scoreboard. He also made a mistake when he stepped heavily on an opponent, playing with fire. The Algerians asked for a red card, but the referee didn't send him off.

From the young Lamine Yamal and Pedri González, main hopes of the Spanish team, to legendary veterans like Leo Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Luka Modrić, still references for Argentina, Portugal, and Croatia, respectively. Few World Cups in history have had such a wide spectrum in terms of the age of the stars who will be part of it. The World Cup starting this June 11 will be the longest to date (48 teams), and also one of the most fiercely contested. Will the albiceleste" repeat the ecstasy of 2022? Will France be as superior as its starting lineup suggests? Will Brazil once again be a feared opponent by everyone? What will be the surprise team? All these predictions will depend on the role of the ten essential footballers in a tournament that will shake the planet for five exciting weeks.

The World Cup, the most important and anticipated sporting event of the year, is now entering its final phase. From now on, there is no room for error for the 48 teams that, from Thursday, June 11, are competing with a single objective: to be in the final on Sunday, July 19 (9 p.m.) which will be played at the MetLife Stadium located in New Jersey (near New York).