Lionel Messi wants to leave Barcelona. Money can’t be the reason though.
The Argentine is ready to leave the club he’s been with since 2001 with news of him handing in a transfer request breaking earlier this week.
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He’ll have no shortage of admirers and it’s understood that he’ll be available for FREE this summer, even though his contract expires in June 2021.
And speaking of contracts, Messi is on a pretty handsome deal at the Camp Nou.
European Football correspondent Kristof Terreur has quoted Football Leaks in their breakdown of his eye-watering wage package.
So where next for Messi? Well, he’s been linked with the likes of Manchester United, Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester City, where he’d reunite with former Barca boss Pep Guardiola.
Messi's millions
*Data from Kristof Terreur, via Football Leaks
Basic yearly wage: £54.2million
Weekly: £988,000
Image rights per year: £9.1million
Bonuses, signing on and loyalty fee per year: £13million
Whoever he joins, it will send the shiver down the spine of any opposing team. talkSPORT’s Andros Townsend is hoping Messi will come to England, however.
The Crystal Palace star said: “It would be incredible for a player like myself to say he shared a pitch with Lionel Messi. It’s the stuff you tell your kids and your grandkids.
“If it is true and if he does want to come to the Premier League, it would be incredible for not only the Premier League but for every player who hasn’t shared the pitch with him to get that honour.
“Every single game he’d have six or seven players man-marking him!”
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Despite Messi’s time in Spain seemingly come to an end, talkSPORT co-host Danny Mills is convinced the 33-year-old will make a U-turn on his Barcelona future and put pen-to-paper on a new three-year deal.
“It would be amazing to see Messi in the Premier League,” he said.
“For those who haven’t been fortunate enough to see Messi live, to watch him, to see him train, to see him in a game, he is just majestic, he is absolutely sublime.
“His movement, the way he goes around the pitch so gracefully. He does things that you can’t even think of at times. I still think he’ll be at Barcelona, give it a week, two weeks, [and he will sign] a three-year deal, something like that.
“I think that’s the most likely scenario in all of this.”
That rules out a Messi move to Selhurst Park then…
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