The “Iranian Messi” Almost Ended Up in Prison, The Reason Behind This, “Disrupting Public Order”, So What Is It to Live The Life of One of the Greatest Player of Our Era?

Updated On March 18, 2024 | Published By: Chirlot Sharma | In controversy , Interesting Facts

An Iranian student called Reza Parastesh, who looks very much like his sporting idol Lionel Messi almost landed in jail for deranging the public order in Iran this week.
In this session, we will look into the incident and its backdrop.

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The Rise to Fame

Reza Parastesh resembles so much his sporting hero Lionel Messi. The furor started a few months ago when Parastesh’s football-crazy father pressured the 25-year-old into posing in a number 10 Barcelona jersey and he sent the pictures to a sports website.

“I sent them one night and by the morning they had called me and said I should come in quickly for an interview,”

he told AFP.

Despite his early unwillingness, Parastesh soon liked and grew into his new role. He also cut his hair like Messi and often wore the Barcelona jersey when he went out.

It sort of paid off – he got fully booked with media interviews and also landed modeling contracts.

“Now people really see me as the Iranian Messi and want me to mimic everything he does. When I show up somewhere, people are really shocked,”

Parastesh said.

In an incredibly odd TV interview, Reza even revealed that his dad stopped him from coming home after Argentina’s narrow 1-0 win over Iran once.

Confusion

After he cut his hair and dressed up like Lionel Messi, his resemblance was so similar that Eurosport UK reportedly put his photo by accident on Twitter recently when talking about the real Lionel Messi.

Almost in Jail

This weekend, so many people came out to take selfies with Parastesh that the police of the western Iranian city of Hamedan, had to rush him to a station and impound his car to stop the chaos and clear traffic.

Also read The Record Breaker: Lionel Messi scored his 100th Champions League goal as Barcelona thrashed Chelsea 3-0

Short Bio of Lionel Messi

Lionel Messi is an Argentine professional footballer. He is best known as a player for the Spanish club FC Barcelona and Argentina national team. He is considered to be the best player in the world and has become the only player to win five FIFA Ballon d’Or awards, four of which he won consecutively, and the first to win three European Golden Shoes. More Bio…

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