Lionel Messi has reportedly asked the Blaugrana to let go of their sporting director Eric Abidal ahead of the 2020-21 season.
Abidal and Messi were close team mates playing together for Barcelona for six years since 2007, together clinching four La Liga titles and two Champions League trophies as they helped the Catalans rise through the ranks.
Abidal was diagnosed with liver cancer in 2011 during the final years of his football playing career and a year later the celebrated Barcelona defender underwent a liver transplant. Barcelona was in the midst of a home game when the left-back was laid up in the operating theater. Apparently the whole Nou Camp, including Messi and the rest of the entourage, and close to 90,000 spectators applauded for Abidal to show their support.
Two years after the major surgery, Abidal retired from professional soccer as an Olympiacos player, where he played for the final year of his decorated career.
The personal relationship between Messi and Abidal in those early years was definitely much more than just a professional one as only a few years later, when Abidal was accused of an illegal liver transplant, Messi went out of the way to back his former colleague. And all went well between the two until Abidal returned to Nou Camp this time as a replacement for Roberto Fernandez as the club’s sporting director in 2018.
Unfortunately since then, the former Lyon defender has been singled out as the right-hand man and collaborator of Josep Maria Bartomeu, Barcelona’s incumbent president, who is currently being accused of corruption and being the main perpetrator responsible for the downfall of the club in recent times. Bartomeu has openly been accused of internal politics and needless signings that have not aided Messi and his team mates in any way this season.
One of the most shocking accusations against the president was that Bartomeu had contracted the services of a few social media agencies behind the scenes in a surreptitious move to scandalise Messi and other past and present key Barcelona personalities whilst portraying himself as the savior of the club.
The news was confirmed later when six board members resigned en-bloc from their respective posts after writing a joint letter disclosing that they were forced to deny that the president had not appointed hackers to defame the club.
The fallout between Messi and Abidal was triggered off when the latter publicly criticized the Barca squad stating that the players slacked under the management of Ernesto Valverde and which is why the club was forced to sack the Spanish boss. Messi instantly took offense to the insinuations incriminating him and did not tolerate Abidal’s comments made public to the Spanish media and as retaliation, he took to social media to slam his former teammate.
According to a recent report in Diaro GOL, a frustrated Messi has asked Barcelona to get rid of both Abidal and Bartomeu.
Barcelona have been in a quandary since these internal issues cropped up, with several reports having emerged stating that Messi could leave Barcelona this season as he was fed up with the politics and corruption infesting the club.
It was earlier reported that a clause in his current contract allows him to leave as a free agent at the end of the current season.