Exactly. What other club is forcibly losing their best player? None. Except maybe Leganés when Barcelona were allowed to steal Braithwaite for no fecking reason at all.
Lionel Messi \ Signs for PSG
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I mean it sort of clearly is - they've gone public with it to put pressure on La Liga.
Because the spanish clubs are all fecked financially, they've introduced a wage cap. With Barca's wages being sky high without selling numberous players (Which they haven't managed to yet) they simply cannot register Messi with the league to reach the cost cap.
So there's only 3 available options.
A. Let Messi leave
B. La Liga get cold feet and somehow allow them to bypass the wage cap to keep him
C. They managed to sell enough players to make room for him (this probably won't be possible)
Right now it seems like Barca and Madrid are having a civil war with La Liga over the super league fiasco. Maybe this is the way they're getting back at them. Either way the fall out will be ugly.
It's not a case of Messi/Barca wanting to go separate ways, more that they've been forced. The only way it would work is if Messi basically plays for free and is then paid in 1 lump bonus at the end of the season, i'm sure they'll find a work around.
Where else is he supposed to go??
Messi que un club 
BBC now reporting that they think this is a power play between laporta and tebas (la liga) chairman. As do journalists in France. Basically Messi will be playing for Barcelona next season, la liga need to relax their financial restrictions.
I found this interesting on BBC, by Spanish football writer Andy West:
So basically, if Barca completely and publicly abandon the Super League, they're free to re-sign Messi.
Oh yea, when they reinvented the transfer window to help them buy more useless tat.
There should be no crying for Barcelona, they have one of the elite youth set ups & had one of the greatest players ever but they started to ego purchase once neymar shunned them & have ruined the club.
I'm not sure. Tebas would massively lose face and be pushed to resign if he now relaxes the rules for them.
In any case, it's madness for Barsa to keep on hanging on to Messi. Just give the legend the best sending off possible and tear down properly, not by borrowing more, but by selling off assets. Just accept that you'll be in the wilderness for a couple of seasons and start building around Pedri. Barsa is a colossal club and they'll be back. There was life before Messi and there will be again like anyone who started watching football before Instagram and FIFA knows.
Only PSG and maybe chelsea may afford him.
Yes what your saying makes perfect sense. However when has football ever been run with sense and logic in mind?
Its a really intrguing power play. Barca are against the CVC investment. However they want to re-sign Messi. La liga wont allow them to. So Barcelona annouce the biggest star in world football is leaving (the league). That will have an impact on the CVC investment which no doubt will have some penalties/get out clauses if the biggest star of the show isnt on centre stage.
So Tebas is basically saying, get onboard with the CVC investment, abondon any ESL aspirations and you can re-sign Messi.
Laporta has called his bluff and said well Messi is off, this shit show is now yours to deal with. "Whats your next move tebas?"
Woodward really needs to get out of his a** and get this done. It is perfectly fine to increase the club debt to get Messi.
Exactly!
Seems to me some people at Barcelona value Messi more than the long term financial well being of the club. I can understand La Liga making a stand. It's absolutely right they would rather have Barcelona and Madrid survive any financial meltdown and going bust than Messi playing for a few more years. Rebuild from the academy and give away some of the star players.
To be fair they/Koeman has actually been doing this as they integrated alot of youth into their side last year, Pedri being the obvious standout.
No one wants to buy their stars though.
Other leagues survive without Messi. In fact, the Premier League is thriving. It's about an overall product, not just Barcelona and Real.
Have Spurs and Arsenal thrown their hats into the race to sign him yet?
There would be a queue of clubs wanting to require the services of some of their players if they really wanted to save on salaries. To make matters more confusing they went onto require players for free this summer at more costs. There's something weird going on in Barcelona. The problem is they just want to keep Messi at the expense of other players so understandably other players are on a mission to stand their ground.
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As a Manchester United fan, it would be disappointing if we spunked absolutely sh*tloads, no, OBSCENE amounts of cash on one of the greatest footballers in history ... near the end of his career. Let another club do that, we'd be buying his name and reputation only. Still an awesome player but that money could be much, MUCH better spent.
https://www.fcbarcelona.com/en/news/2070529/leo-messi-fc-barcelonas-historic-record-breaker
Leo Messi, FC Barcelona's historic record breaker
..."The Argentine superstar is leaving FC Barcelona as the player with the most goals, the most appearances, the most titles and a host of other incredible records too..."
The records are crazy....
Leo Messi, FC Barcelona's historic record breaker
..."The Argentine superstar is leaving FC Barcelona as the player with the most goals, the most appearances, the most titles and a host of other incredible records too..."
The records are crazy....
Thats where La Liga pale compare to PL. The football outside the big three itself is just fine but there's something about their matchday coverage and quality product packaging thats make me stay away from theirs. Their game time not helping too. Who would watch La Liga at 3am in the morning? even for El Classico i wont wake up for that. Compare to PL which even occasionally i will watch bottom feeder games even if it just mildly entertain. I dunno its on TV station or La Liga itself.
I think Laporta banking on that star power Mesei has to make Tebas cave in.
The league itself has been bad at marketing and improving their product. Tebas had prime Ronaldo and Messi and they didn't really build on that. And many of their top clubs have not been managed well enough for them to thrive commercially (think Valencia) despite the quality displayed on the pitch over the years. They've failed to build up
That said, I think even if La Liga was run by marketing wizards it could never roll with the inbuilt advantages that the Premiership has. One, it's the biggest most popular league in the Anglosphere (everyone speaks English and can follow and understand) and two, the atmosphere in English league games is just more compelling than in Spain. Like you mentioned, tune in on your average bottom feeder game and there'll be great atmosphere buzzing though the audio on your TV. You don't really get that in Spain unless it's a local rivalry or they have the "rich arrogant bastards from Madrid rolling into town". The quality on the pitch would be good, but the overall feel is just not there.
In a nutshell.
Barça will have a new hero in no time, those feckers always do. Ridiculous set of names that have graced that shirt.
Could possibly have Pogba & Mbappe in La Liga next season to start the new era.
Please tell that to all the 16 year olds on social media that are certain that Barsa will face relegation and disappear from the face of the earth. You tell them about Kubala, Cruyff, Maradona, Laudrup, Romario and Iniesta and how things will be allright at one point for them and they go "Yeah, but they were not the GOAT!!!!"
People are going nuts about this.
Yeah I’ve noticed, bizarre reactions.
Personally think Barça will ultimately be better off, just as when they jettisoned Ronaldinho and we all thought “wtf”. They need this to free up options for a genuine rebuild. Mark my words, next Summer they’ll be signing a World superstar again after going close in the La Liga race.
so barca want him to stay, he wants to stay, the new La Liga deal gives them enough money to re-sign him, yet because barca want the option to walk away and join the ESL and essentially destroy La Liga if they get more money this has happened?
Forgive me for not giving two-shits about Barca's crocodile tears.
Forgive me for not giving two-shits about Barca's crocodile tears.
He wants to stay as long as they continue to pay him a shite load of money more like.
sure, but unless i've misread the situation, this whole shitshow is down to barca wanting eventual ESL money and complaining they can't have all the money. I hope he leaves just to watch barca suffer.
They're a dramatic bunch aren't they. Feck me, why are you crying over Messi. Look at United, at some point (Moyes era especially) we've gone from King of England to meme football club overnight and none of us were crying. We were just angry and a bit hungry due to spending our time being angry.
Feck La Liga dramas. El Chiringuito TV especially makes me cringe every time I see it because it's even more dramatic than infotainment and gossip shows. It's the football version of "leave Britney alone" times 10.
Feck La Liga dramas. El Chiringuito TV especially makes me cringe every time I see it because it's even more dramatic than infotainment and gossip shows. It's the football version of "leave Britney alone" times 10.
There's nothing to get done. Messi doesn't want to leave and it's being widely reported that this is a power play and whatever happens between Barca and La Liga, Messi will still be at Barca come the end of the window.
If I understand correctly, it's not solely based on the ESL, it's also about the terms of the revenue share for CVC Capital Partners, having limited access to the full terms of the agreements, and the fact that this would be a deal for the next 50 years. If it's true, I can completely understand being reluctant to agree to this.
I've seen better acting on Corrie ffs
They want/need ESL in order to compete on a more level playing field with PSG & City, without it they’ll forever be getting themselves into a stupid mess trying to keep their very best players on ridiculous contracts in order to stave off interest from those clubs.
Amen. We're a better run club than that. Imagine signing him, his wage would be... astonishing and ontop of that it would result in all of our other players in the squad wanting wage increases. It would utterly destroy us financially all for a year or two of Messi. No thanks. I'd rather have Ronaldo back than Messi if i'm honest and I wouldn't overly been keen on that either.
Keep the money and use it on players that can help the club long term. Let Messi feck off to PSG and swan around Ligue 1, what a personal achievement that will be for him.
It’s fascinating that his wage demands could in theory retire him from European football before he’s ready to go.
I may be wrong but it's seems like Barca are paying way more than anyone else is. I'm not sure they have to go so high on wages.
It reminds me of when John Delaney was in charge of Irish Football. Mick McCarthy would have done the job for half a million and that clown through 3.5m at him. 1.1m of which was as a loyalty bonus for seeing out his 18 month contract
I really love Barcelona and the romance of the club, and it’s an illogical thing built into me from youth. I watched Messi et al in the Camp Nou in 2016 and it was one of the most magical experiences of my life.
But Barcelona will go through its peaks and troughs. They should have let Messi go last year, it would have been the first step in rebuilding after many years of awful decisions and mismanagement. Now what do they have...? But they will rise again, even if there is a Man Utd-like slump there isn’t the competition in Spain that will keep them out of the CL.
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