Since Joan Laporta return as Barcelona president for the second time, it has been his No.1 goal to get Messi to put pen to paper on a new deal, but the Catalan club’s all-time record goalscorer is yet to do so.
Laporta has a very good relationship with Lionel Messi and his father, who he speaks to frequently, but when it has come to reaching an agreement there are still some pending issues to be resolved.
These slight differences could be addressed in the next couple of days, or it could take a bit longer, but Laporta is clear that he wants an agreement to be reached imminently in order to avoid seeing Messi become a free agent, even if it just for a matter of days.
Officially a Barça player since January 8, 2001, when he formalized that commitment symbolically initialed on a napkin, there have been 7,478 days of a commitment that both parties want to extend.
It is possible that Laporta will try to reach an agreement with Messi‘s representatives before midnight tonight (June 30), but sources close to the negotiations note that not all of the remaining issues can be resolved in a few hours unless one of the parties gives in on all their demands.
In the meantime, Messi is currently representing Argentina at the Copa America in Brazil.