Possibility of leaving Barcelona reduced Messi's family to tears

Lionel Messi with wife Antonela and sons Thiago, Mateo and Ciro (right)

Argentine football superstar Lionel Messi has revealed that his decision to leave Barcelona left his wife, Antonela Roccuzzo and three sons, Thiago, seven, Mateo, four and Ciro, two, distraught.

"When I told my family that I could go, it was a drama. They all started crying, my children did not want to leave Barcelona, nor did they want to change schools. Mateo is still little and he doesn't realise what it means to go somewhere else and make your life a few years elsewhere," Messi was quoted as saying by British tabloid, The Sun.

Messi stressed that the decision to stay at Camp Nou and see out the last year of his contract with the club was tough. "Thiago, he is older.

He heard something on TV and found out something and asked. I didn't want him to know anything about being forced to leave, to have to live in a new school, or make new friends. He cried to me and said 'let's not go'. I repeat that it was hard, really," he said.

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