Thiago Motta to retire from football at the end of the season

The Brazilian midfielder, who became an Italian citizen, will retire at the age of 35. He has been part of the great PSG team that recently won the French Cup.

Thiago Motta reflects on his time at Barcelona

Thiago Motta gave an interview to La Gazzetta dello Sport where he talked about his past in Barcelona and revealed an anecdote with Lionel Messi's father after a training session.

The midfielder described what the training sessions were like at La Masia, Barcelona's youth academy. "The training sessions were like a war. Every time I had the ball, all my teammates would shout at me at the same time saying, 'Pass it, pass it!'. And they would come in very hard. Puyol told me to do the same. That's when they started to respect me a little more," he commented.

He then recounted a peculiar anecdote he had with Jorge Messi, the father of the Argentine superstar. "During a training session, I went in too hard on Lionel Messi and his father came to scold me. He said I was going too strong," recalled the winner of the Champions League with Barcelona and Inter. Although later he justified it by saying, "The reality is that it was the only way to stop him."