Five moment Barcelona captain Lionel Messi and Ballon Dor winner has shown he considered leaving the club in 2013.
The Argentina international, that has been at Barcelona because he was 13 and so is their all-time high scorer, said he believedbadly handled by Spain if he was investigated for tax fraud at 2013.
He had been found guilty in 2016 with his father Jorge of defrauding the Spanish government of $4.2m between 2007 and 2009 over earnings gained from image rights.
Messi was handed a prison sentence of 21 months and ordered to pay a fine of $2m. He did not serve any prison time after he managed to swap his own sentence as in Spain defendants without a conviction are allowed to serve any sentence of below two years on probation.
He was first researched in 2013, starting lots of of tax fraud cases against high-profile footballers in Spain such as Marcelo, Javier Mascherano and Cristiano Ronaldo.
Sincerely, at the moment , I thought about leaving, Messi confessed to Barcelona-based radio channel RAC1 in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
Not due to Barcelona but because I wanted to leave Spain, I felt really poorly treated and I didnt need to keep here any longer.
I had my doors available to many clubs but I still never got an official deal because everybody knew I needed to remain. This situation went way beyond my feelings for Barca.
Messi also suggested because they cracked down on tax fraud after the economic crisis struck of Spain, that the Spanish tax authorities made an example.
I was the very first and thats why they came down really hard on me personally. They created an example of me and also showed it was going to be like that for everybody. It was tough because of everything that was happening at that time, he said.
Read more here: http://test.malmass.co.id/?p=10221