Lionel Messi will have to meet again with Josep Maria Bartomeu, whom he denounced, reports Deportations Cuatro. The superstar of Barcelona is asked by the president of the club to hand in his last year of contract. Bartomeu’s appeal is rather bizarre, because the president himself made sure Messi had to stay with Barça.

Ten days ago the soap opera about Messi came to an end, which announced on 4 September that it would stay with Barcelona for another year. The 33-year-old Argentinean mentioned in an interview with Goal destructive to Bartomeu, who according to Messi didn’t keep his word by not letting him leave. Messi said he had a verbal agreement to decide his future after each season, but Bartomeu did not go along with that and pointed to Messi’s redemption clause of 700 million euros. The latter did not want to bring a lawsuit against his own employer and resigned himself to an extra year at the Camp Nou.

It is unclear how big the salary sacrifice Barcelona is asking from Messi. From hacked contracts that previously came out through the platform Football Leaksit turned out that Messi currently earns a base salary of 71 million euros. With signing fees and loyalty bonuses, the Argentinean came to a salary of over one hundred million euros per year (excluding bonuses for winning prizes). This makes Messi solo responsible for seventeen percent of the salary burden, which totals some 600 million euros.

Barcelona is facing financial problems as a result of the corona crisis. The Catalans saw a huge part of the turnover disappear and even felt compelled to do an accounting trick. Arthur Melo was sold in a disguised exchange to Juventus, which Miralem Pjanic had just sent to Barcelona. In this way the transfer figures were polished up and a large accounting loss for last season was averted. The exact annual figures of Barça still have to be known.