President of La Liga Javier Tebas, said the Spanish top flight would not have suffered losses had Barcelona star Leo Messi left the Camp Nou.
The 33-year-old Barca all time top goal-scorer, handed in a transfer request following a tumultuous 2019-20 season, which saw Barça humiliated 8-2 by Bayern Munich in the Champions League quarter-finals and dethroned by Real Madrid in La Liga, before the six-time Ballon d’Or winner opted to remain at Camp Nou this term.
Speaking to reporters, the La Liga president said;
“I’m not sure departing Barca would have been good for Messi”, says Tebas.
“As I always said, I will always want to see Messi in LaLiga. If he stays at Barcelona, much better for Barcelona.
“The union between Barcelona FC and Messi is so good for Barca, for Messi and for LaLiga. I’m not sure whether departing from Barcelona would have been a good idea for Messi.
“Maybe yes as a player, but not for Messi as a football industry, because Messi is a machine in creating industry around him. Not sure whether it would have worked for him.
“Messi will finally stay but I must say that we had already sold LaLiga TV rights worldwide for the next four years and nobody called us asking to cancel that agreement in case Messi would leave. No one.”
“We could move from a health pandemic to a financial pandemic” says Tebas.
