According to a source close to the negotiations, Argentine superstar Lionel Messi will play in Saudi Arabia for the upcoming season as part of a “huge” deal. This information was provided to AFP on Tuesday.
“This contract is unique in every way. It is very large. We are just putting the finishing touches on a few minor details at this point,” added the source, who was not authorized to speak to the media.
When questioned about the remarks, Messi’s current club, Paris Saint-Germain, simply stated that he is still bound by his contract until the 30th of June.
According to a different source within PSG’s organization, “if the club had wanted to renew his contract, it would have been done earlier.”
PSG, which is owned by Qatar, gave the 35-year-old former World Cup winner a one-week suspension for making an unauthorized trip to Saudi Arabia, where he works as a tourism ambassador.
Following in the footsteps of his fiercest rival Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi is rumored to be moving to the oil-rich kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Ronaldo made headlines in January when he signed a massive deal to play for Al Nassr, a club in the Saudi Pro League.
According to Forbes, Ronaldo will be the highest paid athlete in the world if his contract, which runs through June 2025 and is rumored to be worth more than 439 million dollars, remains in effect.
According to the source, the Public Investment Fund (PIF), which is one of the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world and has assets worth more than 620 billion dollars, is providing financing for both of the transactions.
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“The discussions didn’t last nearly as long as the ones with Ronaldo did. As we are now aware of the steps necessary to sign players of the highest caliber, the source stated that.
“It was Saudi Arabia, and not a particular club, that brought him here. There is only one source for the money: the PIF.
On the field, the arrival of Ronaldo has not had the kind of impact that Al Nassr had hoped it would have.
They are no longer in contention for the King’s Cup or the Super Cup after falling from the top spot in the Saudi Pro League table and being eliminated from the competition.
In April, the French coach Rudi Garcia left his position.
– PSG protesters –
After a glorious era at Barcelona, during which he won four Champions League titles and ten La Liga titles and is still worshipped by the fans, Messi, who will turn 36 in June, has had two lackluster seasons in Paris. This comes after he had a glorious era at Barcelona, during which he won ten La Liga titles and four Champions League titles.
PSG won the Ligue 1 title with relative ease thanks to the contributions of the record seven-time world player of the Year, who scored just 11 goals in his first season with the club but joined a potent attack that also included Kylian Mbappe and Neymar.
Even with the legendary Argentine in the starting lineup, Paris Saint-Germain was not able to advance any further in the Champions League and was eliminated twice in the round of 16. This prevented them from achieving their goal of winning the tournament for the first time.
The tensions finally came to a head at Paris Saint-Germain a week ago, when protesters dressed in black set off flares and chanted insults directed at Messi, Neymar, and Marco Verratti, an Italian midfielder.
Messi’s career-crowning moment occurred in December, when he led Argentina to a breathless World Cup final victory over Mbappe and France in Doha to fill the biggest gap in his resume. These angry scenes contrasted with Messi’s career-crowning moment at the time.
At the ceremony for awarding the trophy, the emir of Qatar dressed him in a traditional bisht robe as a visual reminder of the wealth from fossil fuels that is flowing into football and into Messi’s bank account via PSG.
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Nevertheless, Messi is also a highly compensated tourism ambassador for Qatar’s neighbors and sometimes rivals Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest oil exporter and is attempting to diversify its largely single-stream economy. Qatar is a country that borders Saudi Arabia.
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