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After Messi Hong Kong Blowback, China City Nixes Argentina Match
(Bloomberg) -- Amid a public uproar in China over Argentine football great Lionel Messi’s failure to play in a recent Hong Kong match, a major Chinese city has scrubbed a game scheduled for his national team.
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The upcoming friendly with the Argentine squad has been canceled due to “well-known reasons,” the sports authority in the eastern city of Hangzhou said in a statement posted on its social media account Friday. Argentina had been expected to play against Nigeria. “The conditions for holding such an event” aren’t right, according to relevant departments in charge, it added, without providing further details.
The development suggests controversy continues to grow over Messi’s trip to Hong Kong, when he sat out an exhibition match due to injury and didn’t interact with fans. Days later, he played for half an hour for his club team Inter Miami in a friendly in Japan, which was seen to rub salt into the wound.
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The Global Times, a nationalist tabloid run by China’s Communist Party, said in an editorial that Messi had failed to apologize and the impact of the incident went far beyond “the realm of sports.” It also said political motives by Messi and Inter Miami can’t be ruled out.
In a post on China’s Twitter-like Weibo late Wednesday, the Argentine World Cup winner told fans he regretted being unable to play in Hong Kong due to an injury to his adductor muscles — reiterating remarks he made Tuesday during a press conference in Tokyo.
Beijing Match
“Friends who know me will know that I want to give my best in every game, especially when I come from a long way with my teammates,” Messi wrote, adding that he looked forward “to returning to the mainland as soon as possible to share the joy of football with you.”
Messi last played in mainland China in June, when he led Argentina in a friendly match against Australia at a packed Beijing stadium. The national team is scheduled to play against Ivory Coast in Beijing in March, according to a January report by the state-run Xinhua News Agency. Authorities in Beijing haven’t issued any statement with regard to that plan in the wake of the Hong Kong incident.
Public anger could threaten Messi’s partnerships with Chinese brands. Hundreds of users flooded the comment section of a Weibo post Messi made earlier to promote the Chi Shui He liquor brand, with many calling on the company to cut ties with him.
Hong Kong’s government had said in several statements following Messi’s no-show that authorities and football fans were “extremely disappointed that Messi could neither play in the friendly match nor explain to the fans in person upon request.”
Inter Miami was established in 2018, making it one of the newer teams competing in Major League Soccer in the US. It was launched with the backing of former Manchester United FC, Real Madrid CF and LA Galaxy star David Beckham, who’s a co-owner.
Messi joined the club last year. Billionaire Jorge Mas, Inter Miami’s managing owner, said in a July interview that its value could reach $1.5 billion within a year.
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