Messi shares emotional call with wife after Copa America win
Lionel Messi has returned to Barcelona following his summer break and is set to put pen to paper on a new five-year contract. But the deal will apparently include an exit clause which can be triggered two years down the line.
Lionel Messi apparently has a clause in his new Barcelona contract (Image: GETTY)
A whole host of international stars have spent the latter part of their careers in the MLS.
David Beckham played for LA Galaxy in his twilight years before returning to Europe with spells at AC Milan and PSG.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic spent nearly two years at the same club, while the likes of Steven Gerrard, Thierry Henry and Andrea Pirlo have all ended their career in the MLS.
Before Messi chose to commit to Barcelona, there had been rumours of him coming to England, with Manchester City apparently interested.
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But one man who is pleased that Messi won’t be gracing the Premier League is former Crystal Palace chairman Simon Jordan.
"I don't want our league to be turned into the Harlem Globetrotters or a replication of the Galacticos mentality," Jordan recently told talkSPORT.
"The fact of the matters is if you get Lionel Messi now, he's not the Messi you would have wanted to have seen.
"I'm not sad to not see him rock up here. I'm not sad to see the mentality of this enormous salary be brought into the Premier League so our poor underpaid Premier League stars can say, 'Hang on a second - by that level we're underpaid.'
Lionel Messi is set to sign a new contract at Barcelona (Image: GETTY)
"So I'm pleased he's staying with Barcelona. I'm pleased he's staying in that dreadful Spanish league where they have the audacity to point a finger at our league and say that we break the transfer records."
A move for Messi to the United States may also raise the appeal of La Liga in the region.
Earlier this summer it was announced that ESPN had obtained the US broadcast rights for the competition for the next eight years.