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Lionel Messi said on Friday that he will remain at Barcelona, but only because the club’s president, Josep Maria Bartomeu, broke his word to let him leave.
Messi’s sharp attack on Bartomeu and the club means his future still remains in doubt.
Even if he is not allowed to go this summer, the 33-year-old Messi can negotiate with other teams starting January 1 and leave for free when his contract expires in July.
Bartomeu could still respond with his resignation, having previously indicated that he would resign if Messi said publicly that he was the problem and agreed to stay.
But three hours after Messi’s explosive interview with Goal, Barcelona had made no public statement.
“It’s been a long time since there was a project or something at all,” Messi said. “They’re always juggling and plugging holes.”
Messi believed he had a clause in his contract that meant he could leave for free at the end of last season, but Barca said that option expired on June 10.
“The president always said that at the end of the season I could decide if I wanted to leave or if I wanted to stay and in the end he did not keep his word,” Messi said.
And this is the reason why I am going to continue at the club … because the president told me that the only way out was to pay the buyout clause of 700 million euros.
“This is impossible, and then the other way around was to go to trial. I would never go to court against Barça because it is the club that I love, that gave me everything since I arrived, it is the club of my life, I have made my life here “.
Messi had requested to leave the club he joined as a child following Barcelona’s humiliating 8-2 defeat to Bayern Munich in the Champions League, with Manchester City as favorites to sign him.
His lawyers sent Barça a burofax on August 25 indicating his intention to leave, but Messi says he made his feelings clear to Bartomeu long before.
“I told the club, especially the president, that I wanted to go,” Messi said. “I’ve been telling you all year. I thought it was time to step aside.
“I thought the club needed more young people, new people and I thought my time in Barcelona was over, feeling very sorry because I always said that I wanted to finish my career here.
“It was a very difficult year, I suffered a lot in training, in games and in the dressing room. Everything became very difficult for me and there came a time when I considered looking for new goals, new horizons.
“It was not because of the result of the Champions League against Bayern, I had been thinking about it for a long time. I told the president and the president always said that at the end of the season I could decide if I wanted to go or if I wanted to stay and in the end he did not end up keeping his word. “
Barcelona ended the season without a trophy for the first time since 2008, which also extended Messi’s failed streak in the Champions League to five years.
He has scored 634 goals and has won 34 titles with the club he joined at age 13 and where he passed through the ranks of La Masia.
Messi said his decision to leave left his wife and three children distraught.
“When I told my family that I could go, it was a drama,” he said. “They all started crying.”
Despite his discontent at having to stay, the Argentine insists he will give everything for the team next season with new manager Ronald Koeman, who is trying to reform the squad.
“I will continue at Barça and my attitude is not going to change, no matter how much I have wanted to go,” Messi said.
“I will do my best. I always want to win, I am competitive and I never like to lose.”
Messi was absent from preseason training last week as he kept trying to force a move.
“I said before that we could not win the Champions League. Now I do not know what will happen,” he added.
“There’s a new coach and a new idea. That’s fine, but then we have to see how the team responds and if that means we can compete or not. What I can say is that I’m staying and I’m going to do my best.”
ta / dj
