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BARCELONA (Reuters) – La Liga issued a statement on Sunday saying Lionel Messi’s contract with Barcelona remained valid, days after his shocking announcement that he wants to leave the club and hours after he failed to see a preseason doctor .
The fact that Messi was not shown by his doctor underscored the 33-year-old’s determination to leave the club he has been with throughout his career.
The six-time world player of the year insists he has a clause in his contract that allows him to walk away with a free transfer, a claim disputed by Barcelona and now La Liga.
The governing body said the only way a club can sign the Argentine forward is if it activates a 700 million euro ($ 833 million) buyout clause.
“In accordance with the applicable rule, La Liga will not approve an application to be terminated as a player in the Spanish soccer federation, unless the amount of the termination clause has been paid,” La Liga said.
Reuters footage showed players arriving for coronavirus tests on Sunday morning and Messi did not appear. He was supposed to be at Barcelona’s training ground at 10.15am local time, but a club source confirmed to Reuters that he had not arrived.
La Liga’s stance is a blow to Messi’s hopes for a quick exit and to those clubs that want to sign him.
The Premier League Manchester City is the favorite, which would allow Messi to link with his former Barcelona manager Pep Guardiola, but even the Abu Dhabi-owned club could find a fee of € 700 million, plus the huge salary of Messi, a decisive factor.
Messi, who has won more than 30 major trophies with the Spanish club and scored more than 600 goals, earns around one million euros a week.
On Tuesday, he informed Barça that he wanted to leave immediately, plunging the club into new turmoil less than two weeks after his humiliating 8-2 defeat in the Champions League quarter-finals against Bayern Munich.
Messi’s lawyers plan to invoke a clause in his four-year contract, signed in 2017, that would have allowed the forward to leave the club for free if he had requested it before June 10.
They will argue that that date, nominally the end of the season, is now irrelevant after the coronavirus pandemic forced an extension of the La Liga season through August.
(Information by Luis Felipe Castillejas and Jordi Rubio; written by Jessica Jones and Martyn Herman; edited by Ed Osmond)
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