There’s only about 10 clubs in Europe that could realistically afford him. He’s on €30m in wages alone at Barca, he’s hardly going to take a massive pay cut, in fact he probably wants one last pay day. I know he’d pay for himself to an extent, but realistically if he doesn’t fuck off to the MLS, China or the UAE to retire then his options are the top ten in terms of value revenue etc. These in order are
Madrid; non runner obviously, Barca are second then
Man U; I mean they could, it wouldn’t be absolutely mental, kind of going against what they are doing but commercially it would make sense I guess. More noddle sponsorships
Bayern; They don’t need him. Unlikely but not impossible
City; Not Peps style of transfer and they don’t get on supposedly. Not impossible the Abu Dhabi boys insist. But they need to spend their money elsewhere in the team. Unlikely but not impossible
Chelsea; again would go against what they are trying to do. Unless Roman comes back to table in a big way it won’t happen. Non runner
Arsenal; I mean, they love signing aging players Would destroy the wage cap, but fuck it if Ozil is worth €20m a season…non runner
Liverpool; Non runner.
Spuds; non runner, no way @ChairmanDan gets the cheque book out
Juve; Ronaldo is supposed to be leaving…surely learned their lesson. I would say mildly possible.
That leaves PSG. They have form in this area with the Neymar transfer. They want to win a CL more than anything so won’t have a problem taking the extremely short term view. It’s purely a prestige thing so having the greatest player in the World join up adds to that for them. They are comfortable paying ridiculous money to a player and not worried about what that does to the wage structure etc. It’s plausible
There’s a massive drop after this to Athleti Woof, Dortmund, Schalke types, none an option.
Inter could possibly stretch to it, but I don’t see it. Everton have more revenue than AC milan. That’s how realistic that is.
Most likely he stays at Barca, after picking the new Chairman and then the new manager. Betting says it’s 1/2 he stays as well
Graham Hunter, Spanish football expert, explaining on SSN that he knows what Messi’s thinking as he’s lived in Barcelona since before Messi arrived in the city, has seen ALL of his games and goals and has interviewed him twenty two, twenty three or twenty four times and counting.
If he’s on a free then wages will hardly be a problem for some of those clubs. You’re probably looking at an outlay of c€20-30m a year. Merchandise alone should cover a good deal of that. I’d make Inter favourites in that regard but with Conte staying now, does he want Messi? Does he fit into his system?
If it’s a case of having to fork out a €100m fee and then pay his wages on top then it probably only leaves PSG and the EPL clubs.