Lionel Messi and Barça have turned the Argentine’s future into a card game that will go on for a long time. The cards are on the table, but not all of them have been discovered yet. And the club is wondering if Messi is going headlong, or really his lawyers are telling him he could leave Manchester City without negotiating his departure, applying a clause that the club considers expired. Bartomeu counters by leaking to the press that he would be willing to resign if Messi says publicly that the problem is him, the president. And the Argentine could break his silence soon. The game of chess continues. And now, it’s up to the player to move piece.
The struggle that breaks the heart of Barcelona is decided in conversations between lawyers and legal advisers. In leaks and messages using the press, waiting for the movement of the other party. In fact, the days go by and the only official spokesman who has spoken about it is the sports director Ramón Planes. Messi shuts up. Bartomeu too. One has already said he wants to leave. And the other, who has excelled in the art of clinging to power, hints that he would be willing to fold to prevent the Argentine from leaving. An operation that, if anything, would prevent the resignation en bloc of a board that wants to exhaust a mandate to keep the club tidy in economic terms, lest the next board be tempted to initiate a liability action against it, as Bartomeu himself voted in favor when he was vice-president of Rosell, in 2010.
Opposition groups called for a cease-fire in Bartomeu’s opposition
Messi’s bureaufax, the latest episode in a cold war between managers and players, threatens to break Barcelona even further. The two sides have, in fact, resorted to consultations with law firms to try to imagine what would happen if Messi left for Manchester City in a few days, without the club’s permission. Both parties believe that the case would end in court, where it would not be resolved until a few years from now, when perhaps Messi has already retired. But neither the player nor the club want to get this far. Sources consulted by ARA within the club explain that, in this context, the logic would be to reach an agreement. But in football, logic is not always present.
Barça are afraid that FIFA will allow Messi to leave City unilaterally, even if there is no agreement. In the event of a conflict with market operations, both FIFA and UEFA prioritize the player’s right to continue playing while awaiting a legal resolution, which is why Messi’s entourage explains that surely, if the ‘Argentine signed for City, could play in the Premier League in a few weeks, although Barça shouted to the four winds that this is an illegal operation. And although, in time, a judge ruled in favor of Barça, who insist that the only way to lose the Argentine, right now, would be for a club to pay the 700 million clause. Messi, on the other hand, defends that the clause he included in his contract in 2017, according to which he can leave Barça unilaterally at the end of each season, is applicable even though the contract says that the deadline to announce it is June 10th. As the covid-19 has altered the calendar, the Messi see a legal gap. At Barça, the possibility of seeing Manchester City send the papers next week confirming the signing with Messi is frightening. And the club lives divided between those who consider that in this case the best solution is a friendly outing and those who want to make hands and sleeves so as not to lose the player, who on Wednesday night had dinner with Luis Suárez. City would also be willing to negotiate, paying more than 150 million if necessary and including players who may be of interest to Barça, such as center-back Eric Garcia, winger Angeliño and striker Gabriel Jesús. And all this, while other clubs, such as Inter and PSG, ask Messi’s father about the situation, just in case.
One or the other
A few days after returning to training, when Messi will take orders from Koeman waiting to find a way out of the club, the pulse continues. And as the Argentine does not pick up the phone to Bartomeu, he has sent a message through the media: if necessary, he will fold but with conditions. One, that Messi openly says that the problem is him and that he stays. And another, that the board ends its term. Bartomeu could go down in history as the president who lost Messi. Or like the one he had to fold so as not to lose a player who could break his silence very soon. This second scenario, however, would not displease Bartomeu either. He would have saved the end of the term and made it all seem like a personal affair between the player and him. When Messi is suspicious of the whole project. Not just the president.
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