Paris Saint-Germain president Nasser Al-Khelaifi insists that Lionel Messi is "happy" and wants to extend his stay at the club beyond the end of his existing contract.
Messi joined the French club on a two-year contract in the summer of 2021 after Barcelona were unable to register a new contract for the playmaker due to their financial situation. After a difficult debut campaign in Paris, he has netted 12 goals and provided 14 assists this term and has spoken of his happiness at adapting to life in France this term.
Messi has been refusing to answer phone calls made on behalf of a negotiator close to Barcelona president Joan Laporta, who is desperate for the Argentine star to return to the Camp Nou but his negotiating tactic has so far proven unsuccessful.
Laporta had planned to meet with his former star player during his visit to the Ballon d'Or awards in Paris in October, but such attempts were unsuccessful. MLS club Inter Miami are another club in pursuit of the Argentine, but despite reports that a deal had been agreed upon at the end of the current season, Messi’s future remains in the balance.
Messi is putting on hold any decision over his future until after the World Cup, where he has carried on his superb goal-scoring form at club level into his national side. Having scored the opener in the Round of 16 victory over Australia, he has now opened the scoring in three of his side’s four games to date.
When the PSG president was asked this week whether Messi, whose deal expires in June, would like to stay at the club, he told Sky Sports: "Definitely. He's very happy, you can see that with the national team. If a player's not happy you will see their performance not good for the national team.
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"He performed fantastically this season for us, he's scored a lot of goals and assists for the national team and for the club. So what we agreed together - that after the World Cup, sit down together. But both sides - our side of the club and him - are very happy, so we will talk after the World Cup."
Last year, Messi was not happy in Paris; struggling to grasp the French language with his young family, who were happy with their life in Barcelona prior to the club no longer be able to renew his contract – with the last-minute nature of his departure seemingly causing friction between the player and the club’s board.
"I like Paris a lot more now, I have discovered the city and I find it magnificent," Messi explained, in quotes carried by Le Parisien last month. "In the first year, there was a huge change. Things happened very suddenly, it was not my objective to leave Barcelona, and everything about it was very abrupt.
"After this long period and the difficult times, I am happy to live where I live, and my family and I are enjoying Paris. It was hard at the start, we had stayed all our lives in the same place, I had never moved, and I did not know what it was like to leave.
"We did not expect this, it happened very quickly, and we had to leave Barcelona overnight. We found ourselves in a new environment. We had our life in Barcelona, our friends, our habits, and we found ourselves in a different place, with another language, another football, another climate, I suffered a lot from that. It was hard. But, today, I enjoy everything including football."
