08 Aug 2021 17:01:10
Watching Messi saying good bye to Barca, was so pathetic, if he loves the club so much, reduce your wages, you have already taken millions from them, time to give back when the club are obviously in financial trouble. How their fans are not outraged is surprising.

{Ed014's Note - his demands to sign a new contract were obscene and I imagine quietly they are glad to be rid of him.

1.) 08 Aug 2021
08 Aug 2021 17:10:01
Pure greed, he is acting like a petulant child. He could quite easily reduce his wage demands and stay. I wonder if he will give it his all for PSG.

2.) 08 Aug 2021
08 Aug 2021 17:25:54
Sure he went public demanding to leave last year. If it wasn’t about money he would have gone back to Newell’s IMO.

3.) 08 Aug 2021
08 Aug 2021 17:50:19
Didnt he offer to take a 50% wage cut to help Barcelona out?

Hes comfortably the best person at his craft/ profession/ trade and has earned the right to seek the best financial contract for himself.

Fans anger should go at one place and one place only, that's the Barcelona hierarchy specifically bartomeu and rosell who allowed the club wages to turnover/ revenue to exceed 100% when something like 70% is considered abnormal for a club.

I mean people call our hierarchy “amateurs” and i'm sure rightly so but what barcs hierarchy did between 2016-2020 was ridiculously incompetent and they're paying the price for it now.

{Ed001's Note - no he did not offer to take a 50% cut, he was offering himself round all of Europe asking for obscene amounts which no one would go near. Barca were offering him 50% less and that was the best offer on the table, at a mere 500k a week. The guy is a greedy mercenary who has milked this fake good guy image for years.}

4.) 08 Aug 2021
08 Aug 2021 19:01:25
Ed001 / he’s a free agent and probably the worlds best football player, now and ever and knows he has gas left in the tank. Why does he not get to choose the best contract he can get? Crying …. after spending 21 years at a club and leaving, can be emotional - no? He’s basically saying he’s choosing mind over heart. Money over just the love but it didn’t have to be a choice. He’s now in a position that he has to choose one - and we all have made some choices like that in life from our perspective. He’s not choosing money over Ethics. Why is he a mercenary?

5.) 08 Aug 2021
08 Aug 2021 19:15:26
I find the crying a bit ridiculous, everyone seems to want to emote nowadays, people sob all the time, they lose a game, time to cry, get relegated, let’s all sob, it’s ok to not be ok but most of the time players just need to get a grip.

Messi has been massively well rewarded for his contributions, great as they have been. He will pitch up at PSG and they deserve each other. As Ed says, he has hawked himself around demanding ridiculous money, a man who has more money than he will ever be able to spend wants more. Feels like an out of control ego and as I said previously, a lack of loyalty to his club that needs him now more than ever.

6.) 08 Aug 2021
08 Aug 2021 20:41:31
"I never imagined saying goodbye",
He was happy to say goodbye last year.
I'm with you AJH, the whinging is a bit much, Pep crying over Aguero was equally pathetic.

7.) 08 Aug 2021
08 Aug 2021 23:32:03
I think he was showing genuine emotion.
I don't think he or the club handled themselves well last year.
He has given great service to Barcelona he is their greatest ever player some would argue that he is the greatest ever player. He is on the wane no doubt about it but he is still ridiculously good on the ball.
He had fallen out of love with Barcelona but still when it comes to an end he has got be emotional. He has spent his life their grown from boy to man and had unbelievable experiences and success. But his mentors have gone his mates have all gone the club has been run into the ground financially and that is not his fault.
He wants a new challenge away from Barcelona and will offer his services to the highest bidder as long as they can win.
Ronaldo did the exact same when Madrid couldn't give him the deal he wanted.
Messi is not perfect but who is?
Is varane a mercenary too? Would he have signed if we hadn't doubled his wage?
Is Phil Jones a mercenary?
He has a couple of seasons left he will make more money in the 10 years after he retires from playing than he made for the last 10 years he has been playing. Who knows what he does or what he wants to do with his money but he is entitled to do what he wants and earn as much as he wants.
If anybody believes he is not genuinely emotional at bringing the Barcelona chapter of his life to a close i'd be very surprised.
Sure he is happy to be getting a new challenge and a new experience. i'm not a fan of psg but they are a huge commercial operation and like man City they are on a mission to capture that cl trophy. I just hope they have enough in the pot to take pogba too.

8.) 09 Aug 2021
09 Aug 2021 09:27:46
Good post ken.

9.) 09 Aug 2021
09 Aug 2021 11:00:22
If Messi played for free, they couldn't keep him.

Barcas wage is at 115% of revenue and the cap is 70%. Without messi's wages, they are still at 95%. Barcelona have been run into the ground and screwed themselves by signing upto the cap without realising how bad their finances were.

10.) 09 Aug 2021
09 Aug 2021 12:10:16
True James.

11.) 09 Aug 2021
09 Aug 2021 21:07:00
Not trying to defend him here as I believe he is a greedy person and is cultivating a fake good guy image.

But I believe according to Spanish law a new contract / contract extension must not be lower then 50% of the previous salary to curb financial manipulation.

So then he would not have been able to take anything less then 50% of his wages.

But obviously his wages are one reason of the mess Barcelona is in at the moment, together with stupid buys like Dembele, Coutinho and Griezmann. But I‘m sure their wages are so high as Messi‘s were astronomical and this destroyed their wage structure.

Anyway, I guess they got what they deserved, to bad Bartomeu isn’t the owner of the Club and has to foot the bill now.