A photo of the famous football player Lionel Messi is circulating on social networks. In the photo, he allegedly holds a piece of paper with the text "Zelenskyi idi ..." (Zelenskyi go..). In the comments, they write that at the opening of the World Cup, Messi voiced his opinion on Ukrainian refugees: “I'm tired of watching this meaningless war! Zelenskyi, take your people and kick them out of Europe, we know the truth!” It is not true.

According to the fact-checkers of the MythDetector project, the photo of Lionel Messi has been altered by software. In the original photo, taken in 2014, Messi was holding a piece of paper with "Fuerza Luca" words written on it, when he was encouraging a 9-year-old fan who was suffering from cancer. Also, in open sources there are no calls by Messi to Volodymyr Zelenskyi.