For Lionel Messi and Barcelona Things Will Never Be the Same Again

Lionel Messi’s U-turn on his future was accompanied by a sadness about the current situation. Photograph: SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images
Lionel Messi’s U-turn on his future was accompanied by a sadness about the current situation. Photograph: SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images
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For Lionel Messi and Barcelona Things Will Never Be the Same Again

Lionel Messi’s U-turn on his future was accompanied by a sadness about the current situation. Photograph: SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images
Lionel Messi’s U-turn on his future was accompanied by a sadness about the current situation. Photograph: SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images

No smile, no handshake, and no reconciliation. Lionel Messi is staying at Barcelona but this was no happy ending. It is over, for now, yet there is no real closure and no one truly got what they wanted, maybe not even Josep Maria Bartomeu. A survivor clinging to power, he will no longer preside over the departure of the best player in the club’s history but nor will he evade responsibility for it. His victory, if that is what this was, is hollow one. Messi made sure of that.

The prospect of his leaving after 20 years at Barcelona was sad and has been avoided for nine months but that was never the worst part. The worst part was that it had got to the point he wanted to leave; that things were so bad, so broken, he would turn his back on it all. And that remains; it has not been fixed by Messi staying, still less by Bartomeu surviving. “I wanted to be happy,” Messi said, “and I didn’t find happiness at the club.”

Doing so now may be difficult; his final decision, taken under duress, did not deliver it. This whole thing was not an act: before, during or, most striking of all, after. It was not a power play, nor a push for a new contract. Messi announced he was staying at the club he “loves” but there was no new deal, no promises, no pretense. Instead, there was sadness as he talked, which he did not on a club channel but on Goal.com. Hours later, Barcelona’s website still had not even mentioned it. It was supposed to be good news, the very best news, but it was not news at all.

There was no celebration, just a kind of weariness. From Messi, there was a blunt honesty, a refusal to gloss over this or act like everything was OK, their differences resolved. He could have backed down, could have said he had felt conflicted, could have asked to draw a line under this whole sorry saga or tried to build bridges, but he did not. He could have said it was a moment’s madness. He did not do that either.

He admitted he wanted to go and accused Bartomeu of reneging on an agreement to let him. He said he had been telling Bartomeu all year, that he had thought about it carefully and that his time was up; it was for others to take over now. He could even have said that he wanted to benefit the club, help them economically but he did not do that either: insisted he was within his rights to rescind his contract and walk for free. Only one thing had stopped him: the risk of ending up in court. Nothing else.

All he wanted to avoid was a fight, but he was not backing down from one either – at least not with the man he held responsible for the fact so much was wrong. The best part of breaking up is the making up but there was no making up with those in charge. On the day he stayed, far from peace, there was a statement from his father reasserting Messi’s legal right to leave. Sure, there was talk of love for the club and the revelation that his children had cried but he would not allow that to serve to protect the president or pretend he welcomed this outcome.

Many supporters are with him on that: plenty wanted him to go, for his sake not theirs, a curious phenomenon emerging in which some of those most on his side backed his departure and some of those most turned against him demanded he stay. His supporters were saddened and hurt but saw other villains and felt he had earned the right to decide. Listening to him joylessly explaining the decision to stay, they would have agreed.

Messi remains, which should be something to be thankful for, but it did not feel like it. Not least because he would not hide behind a facade. Sometimes when players walk out, they deliver a parting shot; Messi delivered his when he walked back in again, the honesty brutal. There are acrimonious splits; this was an acrimonious reuniting.

Read that line again: “I’m staying because the president said the only way to go was to pay the €700m clause, which is impossible, [or] the other way was to go to court.” This from the club captain.

“For a long time now, there has been no project or anything. They’re performing a balancing act, plugging holes as they go along,” Messi said.

That approach was applied to him in the end, too. All year, he said, they had ignored him or put him off, then when it came to it, short-termism took over and they said no.

“I needed it, the club needed it, it was good for everyone,” Messi said but Bartomeu could not afford to let him go. Nor could he really afford to force him to stay but he did.

Messi returns to training this week. “Truth is, I don’t know what will happen now; there’s a new coach, a new idea,” he said. “But I’m going to give my best.” Waiting for him will be teammates who have remained silent and Ronald Koeman, who said: “I only want players who want to be here and give everything.” Messi was not pretending that was him, and things cannot truly be the same now, especially because no one was pretending they are. There is no going back, even when there’s no choice but to do exactly that.

(The Guardian)



Sinner, Berrettini Lift Italy Past Australia and Back to the Davis Cup Final

Italy's Jannik Sinner returns the ball against Australia's Alex de Minaur during the Davis Cup semifinal at the Martin Carpena Sports Hall in Malaga, southern Spain, on Saturday, Nov. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)
Italy's Jannik Sinner returns the ball against Australia's Alex de Minaur during the Davis Cup semifinal at the Martin Carpena Sports Hall in Malaga, southern Spain, on Saturday, Nov. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)
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Sinner, Berrettini Lift Italy Past Australia and Back to the Davis Cup Final

Italy's Jannik Sinner returns the ball against Australia's Alex de Minaur during the Davis Cup semifinal at the Martin Carpena Sports Hall in Malaga, southern Spain, on Saturday, Nov. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)
Italy's Jannik Sinner returns the ball against Australia's Alex de Minaur during the Davis Cup semifinal at the Martin Carpena Sports Hall in Malaga, southern Spain, on Saturday, Nov. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)

Top-ranked Jannik Sinner and Matteo Berrettini won matches Saturday in front of a supportive crowd to lift defending champion Italy past Australia 2-0 and back into the Davis Cup final.

Sinner extended his tour-level winning streak to 24 singles sets in a row by beating No. 9 Alex de Minaur 6-3, 6-4 after Berrettini came back to defeat Thanasi Kokkinakis 6-7 (6), 6-3, 7-5, The Associated Press reported.
“Hopefully this can give us confidence for tomorrow,” said Sinner, now 9-0 against de Minaur.
Italy will meet first-time finalist Netherlands on Sunday for the title. The Dutch followed up their victory over Rafael Nadal and Spain in the quarterfinals by eliminating Germany in the semifinals on Friday.
Italy, which got past Australia in last year's final, is trying to become the first country to win the Davis Cup twice in a row since the Czech Republic in 2012 and 2013. Italy’s women won the Billie Jean King Cup by defeating Slovakia in Malaga on Wednesday.
The much shorter trip for Italian fans than Australians meant the 9,200-seat arena sounded like a home environment Saturday for Berrettini, with repeated chants of “I-ta-lia!” or “Ole, ole, ole, ole! Matte’! Matte’!” amplified by megaphones and accompanied by drums and trumpets. Chair umpire James Keothavong repeatedly asked spectators to stop whistling as Kokkinakis was serving.
“We're in Spain,” Kokkinakis said, “but it felt like we were in Italy.”
Sinner received the same sort of backing, of course, although he might not have needed as much with the way he has played all year, including taking the title at the ATP Finals last weekend.
“It's an honor, it's a pleasure, to have Jannik with us,” Italian captain Filippo Volandri said.
The biggest suspense Saturday on the indoor hard court at the Palacio de Deportes Jose Maria Martina Carpena in southern Spain came in Berrettini vs. Kokkinakis.
Berrettini, the runner-up at Wimbledon in 2021, needed to put aside the way he gave away the opening set, wasting three chances to finish it, and managed to do just that. He grabbed the last three games of the match, breaking to lead 6-5, then closing it out with his 14th ace after 2 hours, 44 minutes.
The big-hitting Berrettini has been ranked as high as No. 6 and is currently No. 35 after missing chunks of time the past two seasons because of injuries or illness. He sat out two of this year’s four major tournaments and lost in the second round at each of the other two.
But when healthy, he is among the world’s top tennis players, capable of speedy serves and booming forehands. He was in control for much of the match against No. 77 Kokkinakis, who was the 2022 Australian Open men’s doubles champion with Nick Kyrgios and helped his country get past the United States in the quarterfinals Thursday.
Berrettini earned the first break to lead 6-5 in the opening set and was a point away while serving at 40-30. Kokkinakis saved that via a 21-stroke exchange that ended with Berrettini sending a forehand long, then ended up breaking back when the Italian missed again off that wing.
Then, ahead 6-4 in the tiebreaker, Berrettini had two more opportunities to own the set. But Kokkinakis — who saved four match points against Ben Shelton in the quarterfinals — saved one with a gutsy down-the-line backhand passing winner and the other with a 131 mph (212 kph) ace, part of a four-point run to close that set.
“It wasn’t easy to digest ... because I had so many chances,” Berrettini said.