Liverpool player Diogo Jota and his brother killed in car accident

Liv­er­pool play­er Dio­go Jo­ta and his broth­er, An­dré Sil­va, were killed in a car ac­ci­dent in Spain when the Lam­borgh­i­ni they were in veered off a road and burst in­to flames, po­lice said Thurs­day.

The Span­ish Civ­il Guard con­firmed to The As­so­ci­at­ed Press that Jo­ta and his broth­er were found dead near the north­west­ern city of Zamo­ra.

Fire­fight­ers were called in as the fire spread in­to the near­by veg­e­ta­tion, au­thor­i­ties said.

Po­lice were in­ves­ti­gat­ing the caus­es of the ac­ci­dent that hap­pened past mid­night lo­cal time. They said there were no oth­er ve­hi­cles in­volved. The bod­ies were un­der­go­ing foren­sic analy­sis.

It wasn’t clear who was dri­ving the car. Po­lice were look­ing in­to the hy­poth­e­sis that the ac­ci­dent hap­pened be­cause of a blown tire.

The ac­ci­dent oc­curred while they were dri­ving east­ward along an iso­lat­ed stretch of high­way about an hour west of Zamo­ra.

The 28-year-old Jo­ta and his 25-year-old broth­er, both Por­tuguese play­ers, were the on­ly ones in the car, po­lice said.

Jo­ta’s death comes weeks af­ter he mar­ried Rute Car­doso and in a so­cial me­dia post wrote, “Yes to for­ev­er.” They had three chil­dren, the youngest born last year.

Jo­ta al­so played for Por­tu­gal’s na­tion­al team and helped it win the Na­tions League last month.

Sil­va played with Por­tuguese club Pe­nafiel in the low­er di­vi­sions.

Liv­er­pool said the club was “dev­as­tat­ed by the trag­ic pass­ing.”

“Liv­er­pool FC will be mak­ing no fur­ther com­ment at this time and re­quest the pri­va­cy of Dio­go and An­dre’s fam­i­ly, friends, team­mates and club staff is re­spect­ed as they try to come to terms with an unimag­in­able loss. We will con­tin­ue to pro­vide them with our full sup­port.”

Jo­ta joined Liv­er­pool from Wolves in 2020 and won three ma­jor tro­phies with the Mersey­side club — in­clud­ing the Pre­mier League ti­tle last sea­son.

The Por­tuguese soc­cer fed­er­a­tion re­leased a state­ment lament­ing the deaths. Fed­er­a­tion pres­i­dent Pe­dro Proença said Por­tuguese soc­cer was “com­plete­ly dev­as­tat­ed.”

“More than a fan­tas­tic play­er, with al­most 50 ap­pear­ances for the na­tion­al team, Dio­go Jo­ta was an ex­tra­or­di­nary per­son, re­spect­ed by all his col­leagues and op­po­nents. He had a con­ta­gious joy and was a ref­er­ence in his com­mu­ni­ty,” Proença said in the state­ment.

The Por­tuguese fed­er­a­tion said it has re­quest­ed a minute of si­lence be­fore Thurs­day’s match be­tween Por­tu­gal and Spain at the Women’s Eu­ro­pean Cham­pi­onship be­ing played in Switzer­land.

“We lost two cham­pi­ons,” Proença said. “Their deaths rep­re­sent an ir­repara­ble loss for Por­tuguese soc­cer and we will all do our best to ho­n­our their lega­cy dai­ly.”

Por­tu­gal’s Prime Min­is­ter Luís Mon­tene­gro com­ment­ed on the “un­ex­pect­ed and trag­ic” deaths. He said Jo­ta was “an ath­lete who great­ly ho­n­oured Por­tu­gal’s name.”

“I ex­tend my deep­est con­do­lences to their fam­i­ly,” he said. “It is a sad day for soc­cer and for na­tion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al sports.”

Re­ac­tion al­so start­ed pour­ing in from across the world, in­clud­ing from non-soc­cer play­ers such as NBA star Le­bron James and ten­nis leg­end Rafael Nadal.

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Jo­ta’s Por­tu­gal team­mate Cris­tiano Ronal­do said. “Just now we were to­geth­er in the na­tion­al team, just now you had got­ten mar­ried. My con­do­lences to your fam­i­ly, to your wife and to your chil­dren. I wish them all the strength in the world. I know that you will al­ways be with them. Rest in peace, Dio­go and An­dré. We will all miss you.”

For­mer club Por­to and for­mer team­mates lament­ed the deaths and sent con­do­lences, as did oth­er clubs, fed­er­a­tions and leagues.

The Pre­mier League said it was “shocked and dev­as­tat­ed.”

“Our sin­cer­est con­do­lences go to Dio­go’s fam­i­ly, friends, Liv­er­pool FC, and all their sup­port­ers at this heart­break­ing time,” it said. “Foot­ball has lost a cham­pi­on who will be for­ev­er missed. We will con­tin­ue to sup­port our friends and col­leagues at the club.”

UE­FA said its thoughts were with rel­a­tives, friends and team­mates af­fect­ed “by this heart­break­ing loss.” It said a mo­ment of si­lence will be ob­served at Eu­ro 2025 match­es on Thurs­day and Fri­day.

AP Soc­cer Writer James Rob­son con­tributed to this re­port.

MADRID (AP) —