Lionel Messi is reported as set to improve his Barcelona contract in the new year, despite recent public comments from the club to the contrary.
Vice-President Javier Faus draw attention to continued rumours from autumn that Barca had been in talks to improve the 26-year-old’s contract by stating that ‘there is no reason’ to improve his deal ‘every six months’.
President Sandro Rosell followed that up the same week by confirming that the player hasn’t been offered a new deal.
However, on from then asserting that Messi ‘must be the highest paid player in the world’ and then seeing the player publicly criticise Faus, reports are that a new contract is indeed around the corner.
AS have it that prompted by Messi’s outburst last week, Rosell contacted those in the forward’s environment and has agreed to meet with the No 10 after the Christmas break to finalise terms on an improved deal.
Terms to the new deal are not stipulated, whilst Messi’s current contract runs until June 2018, has a buyout clause of €250m and already reportedly pays €12.5m after tax. This deal was only signed at the start of 2013.
