Argentina’s much-celebrated triumph in Qatar represents a turning point in Messi’s career, who has already made it clear that he will not play in a World Cup again. It has had enough with five (2006, 2010, 2014, 2018 and 2022) and is no longer seen defending thealbiceleste to the edition planned for 2026 in the United States, Mexico and Canada. However, he is reluctant to step aside now that he has reached the top: “I can’t ask for more. To close my career like this is impressive. I don’t know what else can be after this, but I enjoy the national team, from the group we have, and I want to continue living a few more games as world champion”. The 10 will not give up the armband in the short term. Now he has it in mind to show it off with his homework done, his head held high and his chest warm. A determination that contrasts with the lack of clarity he has exhibited in recent months regarding his future at club level. Because his contract with PSG ends, and the World Cup, at least away from home, has served as a perfect shield to postpone any decision.
At this point, the football world is already wondering where Messi will play from next June 30, having just turned 36. The first possible way is for him to continue in Paris, where he landed in the summer of 2021 after reluctantly leaving Barça. He signed for two seasons with the Franco-Qatari club. The first year was marked by a difficult acclimatization in the French capital, by a badly treated covid and by the elimination in the Champions League against Madrid. All of this meant that he was left out of the fight for the Ballon d’Or that Karim Benzema lifted. The greyness, however, has been colored in recent months: Messi and his family have found a stability in Paris that has had a direct impact on the field of play. Not only because of the World Cup that the Argentine has just won, but also because of the improved performance shown during the first part of the campaign at Parc dels Prínceps, in which he scored 12 goals and provided 14 assists in 19 official matches. This performance, added to the commercial impact it generates, makes it clear to PSG that they want to renew him. This has been stated by its president, Nasser al-Khelaifi, who plans to meet with the player in the coming weeks to close his continuity. For now, all he’s got is a picture with him and the World Cup.
The other big club in Europe that sighs for Messi is Barça. Or this, at least, is what emerges from the words of its executive president, Joan Laporta, who feels “responsible” for the sad farewell at the beginning of August 2021, when the Barça club fell in love with the fair play financier of Tebas, the fine print of the agreement with CVC and the words of Laporta himself, who in the electoral campaign had said that the continuity of the 10 would be resolved “with a roast“. Hence the desire of the leader, who maintains that the Barcelona club has a “moral debt” to a footballer that he would be delighted to recover. The will, however, collides with the harsh economic reality of an institution that once again has the exceeded salary limit, which already knows that it will not be able to activate levers left and right to raise it again and that, to finish it off, next year it will have to go into exile in Montjuïc while the works last of reforming the Camp Nou. All the excitement there is for the reunion meets, for now, with the lack of a plan to materialize it despite the patrimonial difficulty that drags Barça since the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic. Laporta wants to mend the pain, Messi would love to say goodbye to the club of his loves and Xavi is flattered by the possibility of coaching his former team-mate. However, the relationship with Jorge Messi, the figure key to a hypothetical return, remains null. Good intentions abound, but proposals for evils.
A golden retirement in Miami
In contrast to Barça’s lack of prospecting, Inter Miami has been working for many months to convince Messi and make him the main claim of Major League Soccer. Even though those around the footballer deny any closed agreement, the negotiating path with the Florida franchise has existed since before the Argentine had to leave the Camp Nou through the back door. Led by the brothers Jorge and José Mas and by David Beckham, the Inter Miami project also involves recruiting stars of the caliber of Sergio Busquets or Luis Suárez. All together with the intention of making the team a reference in the competition inside and outside the North American borders. The downside of this route is Messi’s voraciousness and the implicit renunciation of continuing to play in the Champions League, a tournament he has not won since 2015.
