Barcelona teenager Yamal praised by friend and foe for performance against Inter Milan

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — After witnessing from the touchline how Lamine Yamal pushed his Inter Milan lineup to the limit, Simone Inzaghi said talents like the Barcelona teenager come around only once in a half century.

“He’s the kind of talent who is born every 50 years, I had never seen him live and he really impressed me today,” the Inter coach said after Yamal helped Barcelona rally in a scintillating 3-3 draw Wednesday to start their Champions League semifinal series.

“Lamine Yamal caused us so many problems in the last 25 minutes of the first half.”

Barcelona coach Hansi Flick described his 17-year-old player as “a genius" after Yamal put on his latest talent show in his 100th game for the club's senior squad.

“He’s special. I’ve said it before, but he’s a genius,” Flick said. “In the big matches, he shows up, and I think he enjoyed the situation. I’m really happy that this talent, if it only comes every 50 years like Simone said, I’m glad it’s for Barcelona.”

Yamal dismissed any comparison to Lionel Messi in his first press conference for his club a day before Inter came to town. But his performance recalled the best days of Messi as his teammates fed him passes and let him pick Inter apart from the right flank. Each time he had the ball he was either searching for a teammate in scoring position or dipping his head and dribbling past his marker.

His goal was one for the YouTube compilations.

Inter had a 2-0 lead and the momentum from goals by Marcus Thuram and Denzel Dumfries, and it appeared like they'd left Yamal with nowhere to go in the 24th. But he slipped around one defender, sped past a second, and then, putting the ball on his left foot, he curled a shot past the turning heads of at least two more Inter players. The ball smacked the far post and was cradled in the net.

That goal made Yamal — at 17 years, 291 days — the youngest scorer in a Champions League semifinal.

He went so close to bettering that moments later when he glided past two defenders and sliced a shot from a sliver of an angle off the crossbar.

“This guy is incredible,” Manchester City striker Erling Haaland posted on SnapChat with a screenshot of Yamal’s shot off the bar.

Yamal fed passes to Ferran Torres and Dani Olmo for back-to-back shots that Inter goalkeeper Yann Sommer saved before Raphinha took over and headed a ball down for Torres to ram home for 2-2 before halftime.

Dumfries put Inter ahead again before Raphinha ensured the draw with a long-range strike that found the net. But Yamal was disappointed that a final push for a winner came up short.

“The whole world can see what a good footballer he is. He’s a player who shines,” Inter midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan said. “We tried to stop him, but that was so difficult because he’s got great talent. I hope we don’t let him play this much next week.”

Yamal said he appreciated the praise but just wanted to focus on the next match with a European Cup just two wins away.

“I am happy to have helped the team, and now we need to go for more,” he said. “We knew we could have won the game but now we are just focused on the second leg and going through.”

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Barcelona's Lamine Yamal celebrates after scoring during the Champions League semifinal first leg soccer match between Barcelona and Inter Milan in Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, April 30, 2025. AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Barcelona's Lamine Yamal celebrates after scoring his side's opening goal during the Champions League semifinal first leg soccer match between Barcelona and Inter Milan at the Lluis Companys Olympic Stadium in Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, April 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Joan Monfort)

Barcelona's Lamine Yamal celebrates after scoring his side's opening goal during the Champions League semifinal first leg soccer match between Barcelona and Inter Milan at the Lluis Companys Olympic Stadium in Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, April 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Joan Monfort)

Barcelona's Lamine Yamal, center, is challenged by Inter Milan's Carlos Augusto, left, and Inter Milan's Henrikh Mkhitaryan during the Champions League semifinal first leg soccer match between Barcelona and Inter Milan at the Lluis Companys Olympic Stadium in Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, April 30, 2025. (AP Photo/Joan Monfort)

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysia and Indonesia have become the first countries to block Grok, the artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Elon Musk's company xAI, as concerns grew among global authorities that it was being misused to generate sexually explicit and nonconsensual images.

The moves reflect growing scrutiny of generative AI tools that can produce realistic images, sound and text and concern that existing safeguards are failing to prevent their abuse. The Grok chatbot, which is accessed through Musk’s social media platform X, has been criticized for generating manipulated images, including depictions of women in bikinis or sexually explicit poses, as well as images involving children.

Last week, Grok limited image generation and editing to paying users following a global backlash over sexualized deepfakes of people, but critics say it didn’t fully address the problem.

An emailed request for comment by The Associated Press to xAI resulted in an automated reply from the media support email address which stated, “Legacy Media Lies.” This was the same message received from a different email when asked for comment regarding the global backlash.

Regulators in the two Southeast Asian nations said that existing controls weren't preventing the creation and spread of fake pornographic content, particularly involving women and minors. Indonesia’s government temporarily blocked access to Grok on Saturday, followed by Malaysia on Sunday.

"The government sees nonconsensual sexual deepfakes as a serious violation of human rights, dignity and the safety of citizens in the digital space,” Indonesian Communication and Digital Affairs Minister Meutya Hafid said in a statement Saturday.

The ministry said the measure was intended to protect women, children and the broader community from fake pornographic content generated using AI.

Initial findings showed that Grok lacks effective safeguards to stop users from creating and distributing pornographic content based on real photos of Indonesian residents, Alexander Sabar, director-general of digital space supervision, said in a separate statement. He said that such practices risk violating privacy and image rights when photos are manipulated or shared without consent, causing psychological, social and reputational harm.

In Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission ordered a temporary restriction on Grok on Sunday, after what it said was “repeated misuse” of the tool to generate obscene, sexually explicit and nonconsensual manipulated images, including content involving women and minors.

The regulator said that notices issued this month to X Corp. and xAI demanding stronger safeguards drew responses that relied mainly on user reporting mechanisms.

“The restriction is imposed as a preventive and proportionate measure while legal and regulatory processes are ongoing,” it said, adding that access will remain blocked until effective safeguards are put in place.

Launched in 2023, Grok is free to use on X. Users can ask it questions on the social media platform and tag posts they’ve directly created or replies to posts from other users. Last summer, the company added an image generator feature, Grok Imagine, that included a so-called spicy mode that can generate adult content.

The Southeast Asian restrictions come amid mounting scrutiny of Grok elsewhere, including in the European Union, the United Kingdom, India and France.

On Monday, the U.K.'s media regulator said that it launched a formal investigation into whether Grok “complied with its duties to protect people in the U.K. from content that is illegal.”

The regulator, Ofcom, said that Grok-generated images of children being sexualized or people being undressed may amount to pornography or child sexual abuse material.

“The content created and shared using Grok in recent days has been deeply disturbing," Technology Secretary Liz Kendall said.

Edna Tarigan reported from Jakarta, Indonesia.

FILE - Workers install lighting on an "X" sign atop the company headquarters, formerly known as Twitter, in downtown San Francisco, July 28, 2023. (AP Photo/Noah Berger, File)

FILE - Elon Musk listens as President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference in the Oval Office of the White House, May 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)