Amid tax fraud allegations being charged against him and his father, reigning FIFA Player of the Year Lionel Messi will continue to honor his role with the Argentina national football team as they take on Guatemala in an international friendly game at Estadio Mateo Flores on Friday.
The 25-year old Messi will spearhead an Argentine football squad that has been subpar in its previous three international assignments, all of which are important World Cup qualifying matches.
Messi's last international goal took place roughly three months ago when Argentina cruised to a 3-0 victory over Venezuela to cap a three-game winning streak in the World Cup qualifying tourney.
However, Argentina took a step back in the past couple of months as they settled to a draw against lesser competitions. The La Albiceleste played to a 1-1 draw with Bolivia on March 26 and then followed it up with another deadlock against Columbia (0-0) and Ecuador (1-1), respectively.
Argentina (7-5-1, 26 points) is still sitting atop of the CONMEBOL World Cup Qualifier standings but Columbia (7-2-3, 23 points), Chile (6-3-3, 21 points), and Ecuador (7-0-6, 21 points) are slowly gaining their ground.
The friendly against Guatemala is a perfect opportunity for the Argentine team to find different combinations on the pitch and see how Messi respond to perhaps the biggest controversy he ever faced in his football career.
Messi and his father, Jorge Messi, are currently under investigation by the Spanish tax authorities for allegedly defrauding the Spanish government of 4.16 million Euro or $5.53 million in unpaid taxes.
The world's top football player denied the allegation using his Facebook account, saying they have never committed any infringement and always fulfilled tax obligations.
"We have just known through the media about the claim filed by the Spanish tax authorities. We are surprised about those news, because we have never committed any infringement. We have always fulfilled all our tax obligations, following the advices of our Tax Consultants who will take care of clarifying this situation," said Messi on his FB account.
The allegation could really inflict a huge blow on the image of Messi, who could face two to six years of jail time if proven guilty.
Messi still has a chance to turn things around before his football career take a painful nosedive. And there's no better way to make a statement than in his upcoming match-up with Guatemala.