How José Mourinho convinced Lionel Messi to sign for Chelsea

Before this past summer, the idea of ​​Lionel Messi leaving Barcelona was hard to imagine.

Let’s go back to 2014, and the prospect was something even more unthinkable.

Particularly if you consider that the potential destiny for arguably the best player in the world would be to team up with José Mourinho at Chelsea.

But according to Sky Sports journalist Gianluca Di Marzio, such an agreement was much closer than we thought.

So close in fact that Mourinho even convinced Messi that Stamford Bridge should be his new home while the Argentine toyed with the idea of ​​leaving the Camp Nou.

It was around that time that Messi was being investigated by Spanish authorities for tax fraud, a crime of which he was later found guilty in 2016.

He has since admitted that he considered leaving Spain in the middle of the entire episode, which is how negotiations with Mourinho paid off.

The Chelsea manager initially contacted Messi via video chat to present his proposal, such as di Marzio’s new book: Grand Hotel Calciomercato state.

Chelsea were on their way to come back under Mourinho, whose shares were also high after a huge success at Inter Milan and Real Madrid.

The Blues were willing to remove Messi’s buyout clause, which then amounted to € 250 million (this was also before Neymar and PSG).

Not only that, but they were also poised to offer the striker a whopping £ 50 million a year contract to reach the Premier League.

However, Chelsea were not alone in their efforts to tempt Messi to move on, as Real Madrid also risked their arm.

Real president Florentino Pérez even asked for an investigation to be carried out on behalf of the club, only for Messi to reject it outright.

While a switch to fierce Barca rivals, particularly at a time when Messi was considering leaving Spain altogether, seemed inexplicable, a switch to Chelsea interested him immensely.

Di Marzio says it was the appeal of living in London and the respect Messi felt for Mourinho that were the key factors behind his attempt to jump-start a movement.

The former Chelsea star-turned-agent Deco also gave Messi more reasons for a move, telling him to at least talk to Mourinho, but he wanted to arrange the meeting with Roman Abramovich and participate in the mediation between the two parties.

After a meeting with three agents in his own home, none of whom was Deco, Mourinho was able to maintain the video call with Messi in which he went on the offensive of charm, praising the Barça star as “the best”.

Shortly after that initial conversation, Messi was met by Mourinho in person at Stamford Bridge for a meeting with Chelsea manager Marina Granovskaia, who had been briefed on by Blues owner Roman Abramovich.

It was there that the scheme of a deal was launched with few obstacles in its way, apart from Messi’s father Jorge.

Messi’s top manager, up to this stage, had been high on his son’s ambitions to play elsewhere, while Deco had been eliminated entirely and did not participate in formal conversations behind the scenes.

After being tipped off by his former Barça teammate Cesc Fabregas, who was then practicing his trade at Chelsea, Deco decided to draw Jorge’s attention to the deal, which ultimately led to his collapse and left Chelsea ruining what could have been.

Still, there is always 2021 …

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