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What’s the story?
A newly revealed data from United Nations has exposed the inequality of pay in sports as the Barcelona talisman, Lionel Messi is currently earning double as much as all women players in the top seven leagues combined.
According to the UN report, Messi earns about 84 million dollars per year from his wages and bonuses. Meanwhile, the combined annual salary of 1,693 women football players are around 42.6 million dollars.
In case you didn’t know…
Lionel Messi celebrated his 32nd birthday on Monday after safely leading Argentina to the quarter-final stage of the ongoing Copa America campaign. Although Messi and co. were far from their best, they still managed to get the better of Qatar in a crucial group B encounter. Inter’s Lautaro Martínez and Sergio Agüero of Manchester City, were on the scoresheet for Argentina as the 14-time continental champions avoided an early group stage exit.
Messi, meanwhile, has been a subject to talking points throughout the Copa America campaign. Despite being the best player for Argentina, Messi has only managed to score once in three group matches, which exactly depicts Argentina’s recent struggles in big tournaments.
However, the five-time Ballon d’Or winner enjoyed one of his best ever seasons with Barcelona in terms of personal achievements, scoring 51 times in just 50 games in across all competitions in Europe. Messi has also led Barcelona to another La Liga title as the prolific Argentine scored a sum of 36 goals throughout the La Liga campaign, securing his 6th European Golden Shoe in the process.
Despite being at his very best, Messi has once again endured European failure after Barcelona were knocked out of the Champions League semifinal stage in a shocking manner against the eventual winners, Liverpool.
The heart of the matter
The UN have recently published a data on their official Twitter account by exposing the wage gap between men and women in football.
The shocking statistics reveled that Lionel Messi, who is considered to be one of the very best in world football, himself earns double as much as the sum of 1,693 women players combined from world’s top seven football leagues.
“1 male soccer player makes almost double as much as the combined salaries of all players in the top 7 women's soccer leagues,” the Tweet quoted, indicating the huge gap of wages between men and women.
What’s next?
Messi and Argentina will take on Venezuela in the quarterfinals of Copa America on Friday at the Fonte Nova Arena in Salvador.
