President of FC Barcelona, Joan Laporta, has indeed revolted against Lionel Messi’s exit from the club, saying he had trusted that the Argentine would stay to play for the club free of charge.
Barcelona couldn’t bear to keep hold of Messi in the midst of their phenomenal monetary misfortunes, with the club piling up more than £1billion in unpaid liability and recording a £409million loss just for last season.
Messi on the books would rise to 110 percent of their pay, something the club cannot afford.
Subsequently, Lionel Messi bid an enthusiastic goodbye in a question and answer session prior to getting paperwork done for Paris Saint-Germain in the late spring on a two-year bargain.
Talking on Catalan radio broadcast RAC1 on Mundo Deportivo, Laporta, 59, said he had trusted Lionel Messi would without a second to spare consent to play for nothing and expand his 21-year stay, however he eventually recognized a player ‘of his level’ couldn’t do as such, after PSG introduced a ‘exceptionally incredible’ offer.
This is what Laporta had to say;
”With Messi I do not get angry because I appreciate him. But when we see that he could not stay there is a certain disappointment on both sides. I know they had a huge desire to stay, but a lot of pressure because of the offer they had.
Everything indicates that he already had the offer from PSG. Everyone knew that he had a very powerful offer. We knew that from Mesi’s side they had a very good offer.
I did hope that at the last minute Messi would say he would play for free. I would have liked that and he would have convinced me. I understand that the league would have accepted it. But we cannot ask that of a player his level.
I thought it because I know him, he went up to the first team when I was there, I helped his family a lot. He knew that when we our economic situation recovered we would be reciprocated.”