The Madrid giants have their own issues with La Liga and their financial investment ideas for the league, and their criticism came at the same time Barca spoke out
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Real Madrid sent their own message to La Liga at the same time that Barcelona were criticising them for blocking their efforts to keep Lionel Messi at the club.
Barca have confirmed that Messi has left the Nou Camp after 21 years at the club, 18 of which were in the first-team.
He played 778 games for Barca, scoring 672 goals, and lifted 10 La Liga titles and four Champions League trophies.
He also picked up the Ballon d’Or award six times, and became widely recognised as the greatest player on the planet by many, with the world transfixed with his rivalry with Cristiano Ronaldo.
On Thursday Barca confirmed time at the club was at an end though, and attacked La Liga for standing in the way of the negotiations with their strict financial controls.
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The club said in a statement : “Despite FC Barcelona and Lionel Messi having reached an agreement and the clear intention of both parties to sign a new contract today, this cannot happen because of Spanish LaLiga regulation on players’ registration.
“As a result of this situation, Messi shall not be staying on at FC Barcelona. Both parties deeply regret that the wishes of the player and the club will ultimately not be fulfilled.
“FC Barcelona wholeheartedly expresses its gratitude to the player for his contribution to the aggrandisement of the club and wishes him all the very best for the future in his personal and professional life.”
Barca’s frustrations with the league and their restrictions on their squad have been well known for some time, but Real also share grievances with the division over their investment ideas.
In a statement intriguingly timed almost exactly as Barca confirmed Messi’s exit, Real slammed La Liga’s £2.3billion agreement with CVC which could see private equity involved in the running of the division, a first in Europe.
They said : ” Real Madrid, before the announcement of the agreement reached between LaLiga and the CVC fund, states the following:
“This agreement was made without the participation of Real Madrid and without their knowledge and LaLiga has allowed for the first time today that we have limited access to the terms of the agreement.
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“The clubs have assigned the audiovisual rights exclusively for their commercialization in competition and for a period of 3 years. This agreement, using a deceptive structure, expropriates from the clubs 10.95% of their audiovisual rights for 50 years and against the law.
“The negotiation has been done without a competitive process and the economic conditions agreed with the CVC fund give it returns of more than 20% per year. It is this same opportunistic fund that unsuccessfully tried similar deals with the Italian and German leagues.
“Real Madrid cannot support an operation that gives investors the future of 42 First and Second Division clubs and the future of the clubs that will qualify during these 50 years.
“Real Madrid will convene the assembly of compromise partners to discuss the agreement and the significant unprecedented losses in our 119-year history that such agreement would cause.”
The move by La Liga’s big two could be seen as a joint attack on the division, with tensions still high following the abandoned European Super League idea.
