"I would never go to court against the club of my life, that's why I'm going to stay at Barcelona."
The word of Leo Messi has more value than any document, even that of a burofax, especially when there is no choice but to interpret his silence for 11 days, since the legal services of FC Barcelona were warned that the Argentine player He left the Barça club after 20 years at the Camp Nou.
The message from Rosario is that his emotional bond outweighs the contractual one: if the only way to escape is to report the entity, in no case will he sue against Barça.
It is not only a concession, but it is also interpreted as a way to give up due to the contentiousness that his departure meant, a risk that the footballer or any of the candidates for his signing, especially Pep's Manchester City, did not want to take. Guardiola.
At the age of 33, Messi will fulfill the contract with Barça, as required by the board, and will be released on June 30, when the partners will have already elected the substitute president of Josep Maria Bartomeu in elections scheduled for March 15 2021. It is not just any question, because if Messi wanted to leave it was because of his manifest incompatibility with President Bartomeu and not because of any disaffection with Barcelona.
"Juggling to cover holes"
The player distinguished between the management and the club in an interview with
Goal
from his home in Castelldefels.
Messi said in a tone as serene as it was forceful: "There has been no project for a long time and there is nothing, they are juggling and covering holes as things go by."
And then he pointed out to the president: "I've been telling him all year that I wanted to go and he didn't keep his word."
The player feels cheated by Bartomeu after, according to the Rosario, he promised him that he "could decide" whether to stay or not.
“I thought my time in Barcelona was over, feeling very sorry because I wanted to finish my career here.
It was a very difficult year, I suffered a lot in training, in games and in the dressing room.
Everything was very difficult for me.
The decision had been thinking about it for a long time ”.
The pandemic and the clause
Messi always believed that he was free at the end of the competition, and not that he had to avail himself of the escape clause before June 10.
"So we were competing, in the middle of a shit virus, this disease that altered all the dates."
"If I am going to continue," he said, "it is because the president told me that the only way to leave was by paying the clause of 700 million euros" or otherwise, "go to trial."
“And it never crossed my mind to go to trial against Barça because it is the club that I love since I arrived, it is the club of my life;
Barça gave me everything and I gave him everything, "he argued to explain later why he resorted to the burofax:" The president didn't give me a ball;
It was the way of making official that I wanted to go, that I was free, it was my right and I was not going to use the optional year.
It was not to make a mess, but to make a decision made official ”.
Assuming that he has no choice but to stay at the Camp Nou, as if according to him the extinguished right of retention was still in force, Messi announced that his attitude will not change no matter how much he has wanted to go.
“I don't like losing anything.
I will do my best.
I do not know what is going to happen.
There is a new coach and a new idea and that is good, but then we will have to see how the team will respond and if it will give us to compete ”, he concluded, aware that Ronald Koeman has the 10 as leader of his Barcelona .
The Argentine does not want anyone to doubt his love for Barça.
"It hurt me when my love for this club was questioned, that's not going to change," he said.
“Every year I was able to leave and earn more money, but better than here it is difficult.
I always said that I wanted to finish here with a project and win titles to increase the legend of Barcelona ”.
The family will appreciate Leo's decision because their three children “wouldn't stop crying and didn't want to change schools”, all happy to continue in Barcelona and Castelldefels.
The reaction of the fans will not be known yet, because the matches are still played behind closed doors, and there were no comments either from the Bartomeu board.
For legal purposes, the president has gained a very delicate and complicated pulse.
At least his strategy and defense of the contract has been more effective than the harassment of Messi.
The board has not even shown aspects of the agreement with the Argentine star.
She was certain that it was for four years and expired in 2021 with two clauses: one for termination of 700 million euros and one for freedom that the footballer could use at the end of each season before June 10.
The thesis could never be fought by Messi's side, not even after certain aspects of the contract were known that, apparently, played in favor of the freedom of 10. Jorge Messi, Leo's father and agent, even tried until the last minute discuss with LaLiga.
The response of the employer's association chaired by Javier Tebas was just as dissuasive as his statement last Sunday: Messi was worth 700 million as stipulated in the agreement with Barcelona.
Koeman's command
Bartomeu was tormented by the possibility of being the president who had to sign Messi's settlement.
Now he will be able to reach the month of March with more tranquility, and negotiate the renewal of contracts that were at risk due to the lack of presence of the captain, if the motion of censure undertaken by some Barça groups and up to three candidates for the 2021 elections does not prosper.
The opposition has been especially critical of the current board of directors and, in some way, subscribes to the intervention that Messi had this Friday.
The unknown is now knowing when the player will join after previously passing the PCR tests.
Although the Argentine did not show up for the appointment last Sunday, the club will hardly sanction him and will insist on its decision to renew his contract until 2022.
"Neither freedom nor transfer, but continuity", has been Bartomeu's motto.
Messi will continue at least one more season and his last game will not be exactly 2-8 against Bayern Munich.
“Everything was very hard after the defeat in Lisbon.
We knew that we had a very difficult opponent, but that we were not going to end that way, giving that poor image for the club and for Barcelona.
We gave a very bad image.
I was wrong, I didn't feel like doing anything.
I wanted time to pass and then go out to clarify everything, "he stated in his speech in
Goal
.
Messi will no longer meet his friends Luis Suárez and Arturo Vidal now, and his ecosystem in the dressing room will vary with the command of Koeman, who has already recovered Coutinho and does not rule out a signing like Lautaro Martínez as long as Bartomeu manages to reduce before the salary mass of the staff with the pending transfers of Vidal and Umtiti.
The economic situation is as delicate as the sports situation at the Camp Nou.
The team has closed the year in white and the club's accounts are especially delicate, so much so that there was speculation that the board might be interested in transferring Messi.
He needed, in any case, a buyer and none of them wanted to risk a subsequent ruling by the Magistracy.
So in the end the conflict became an internal and self-destructive issue, typical of Barça.
The news is that the two contenders continue at the club: Leo Messi and Josep Maria Bartomeu.
