Soccer legend Lionel Messi introduced his retirement from worldwide soccer on Monday, saying he’ll not play for the Argentina nationwide staff.
“After the time that handed because the ultimate, serious about it rather a lot, I wish to talk to everybody that I’m retiring from the nationwide staff,” Messi wrote in Spanish, in a message shared on Instagram. “It was a choice that harm and hurts my soul, however I perceive that that is the second.”
He continued, “I swear to you that I all the time gave every little thing, not solely the previous couple of years the place every little thing was gained, but additionally earlier than and I all the time fought and left every little thing for this shirt, to present them pleasure and make them really feel proud to be Argentines by means of soccer.”
Argentina’s Lionel Messi cries in the course of the trophy ceremony on the finish of the 2026 World Cup soccer match ultimate match between Spain and Argentina on the New York/New Jersey Stadium in East Rutherford on July 19, 2026.
Paul Ellis/AFP by way of Getty Pictures
Messi final performed for Argentina within the 2026 World Cup, the place the staff misplaced in the finals to Spain, 2-1.
The 39-year-old continues to play skilled soccer as a ahead for Main League Soccer membership Inter Miami CF, the place he has performed since 2023.
Messi shared on Instagram that he first wrote his goodbye message in July, shortly after Argentina misplaced the World Cup title. Lower than one month later, on Aug. 8, Messi’s father, Jorge, died, which the soccer star mentioned bolstered his determination to retire.
“I wrote these phrases on July 21, two days after the ultimate. At present after my dad, I am extra satisfied than earlier than,” Messi wrote.
Messi, himself a father of three sons, performed 19 seasons for Argentina. He retires because the staff’s captain and all-time main aim scorer and because the highest-scoring man in South American soccer historical past, according to ESPN.
Messi helped lead Argentina to a World Cup win over France in 2022, the nation’s first World Cup title in over 30 years.
Argentina’s ahead Lionel Messi is thrown up within the air by teammates following the pleasant soccer match between Argentina and Panama on the Monumental stadium in Buenos Aires on March 23, 2023.
Juan Mabromata/AFP by way of Getty Pictures
There was hypothesis that this yr’s World Cup might be the final for Messi. Argentina misplaced to Spain in an extra-time match in entrance of greater than 70,000 followers in New Jersey.
In his retirement announcement, which Messi wrote on pocket book pages seen in a photograph he shared on Instagram, the soccer star mentioned he would miss the followers of Argentina and thanked the coaches and members of the family who helped him alongside the way in which.
“Thanks for all of the love of those 20 years. I’m going to overlook listening to you from the within very a lot. Now I’m going to be one in all you, all the time encouraging and supporting from the skin (in good instances and dangerous, far more),” he wrote, later including, “I depart with the tranquility and delight of getting given you, along with my colleagues, dream moments. It was loopy to have lived it with you. I like you!”
Messi ended his message by writing, “Thanks God for making me Argentine. Let’s go Argentina!”
