Talk | It is definitely a conspiracy theory to say that Messi "insulted China", but all the core players have made a big mistake

Written by | Yu Ruiyin

Editor丨ZAC

Since the birth of "Brother Refund Money" in 2016, it is the first time that our Chinese fans have seen "Return Money".

A few days ago, in response to the controversy caused by Messi's absence from the Hong Kong trip, China, Tatler Asia, the organizer of the Miami International Hong Kong trip, announced a refund plan: it will provide a 50% refund to the public who purchased match day tickets through official channels.

But it doesn't seem to be enough to completely quell the anger that fans have been burning for days.

Messi probably never dreamed that half a month before and after, he was also temporarily absent in front of the eagerly awaited Chinese fans, but he could not hide decently like Ronaldo, but fell deeper and deeper into the quagmire, and saw that he was about to lose the end of his brilliant career.

Since the lively and weird game at the Hong Kong Stadium on the evening of February 4, in the past five days, the fermentation of the "Messi incident" has long since moved from sports to the public domain, separated from simple commercial competition performance disputes, and gradually mixed with too many political, public opinion, moral and legal factors. With the public statements of Chief Executive Lee Jiachao, Huo Qigang, Huo Qishan's brothers, and many legislators, the condemnation of Messi has been raised to the level that it does not belong to a player. Even if Messi finally "squeezed" a few apologies and clarifications under pressure, the anger that has accumulated at the moment is no longer effortless to extinguish.

Caption: Huo Qigang spoke out for fans through Weibo, and was praised for being well-founded and well-founded.

The angry cutting and burning of Messi's jersey is hard not to empathize with, although not encouraging. Before the refund plan was introduced, for the fans who spent a lot of money to appear at the Hong Kong Stadium, the 90-minute fruitless wait was tantamount to a fraud, compared to Ronaldo's official announcement that he could not play earlier, the organizer's move to refund the ticket and fully compensate for the machine wine can be called a conscience; Messi couldn't get out of the game in Hong Kong, China, but he walked like a fly in Japan, almost all of which were enough to provoke the antagonism of Internet traffic.

Caption: When Messi arrived in Hong Kong, he probably didn't expect to face such a big turmoil.

While the tournament organizer, Tatler Asia, is still arguing with Inter Miami to continue to deepen this lose-lose zero-sum game, the most sympathetic (and perhaps even the only one in the whole thing) fans are all emotionally emboldened, and there is no way to solve it, and there is nowhere to put it. On the one hand, there is the hard search for the truth, and on the other hand, there is the disappointment and disillusionment of idols, among which, there are some invisible black hands that provoke and manipulate them, so that they continue to burst out of nameless fire, so as to achieve some ulterior purposes.

Justified outrage and protests based on the "Messi incident" should be justly supported, but if it is only based on speculation and interpretation on the Internet, it is really a mistake to follow the trend and boycott it, and even resort to the "Cancel Culture" (Cancel Culture) that has become popular in Europe and the United States in recent years.

(Note: The idea of "cancel culture" has its roots in the field of art, and in short, it is the boycott of public figures and their works when they are unable to accept certain words and actions.) For example, J.K. Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series, was "cancel culture" because of his gender and political affiliation, and was not even invited to the 20th anniversary party of the film crew. ）

Is it a "collective decision" or an "individual obsession"?

Regarding Messi's strange absence on the evening of February 4, an Internet blogger who tried to defend Messi made an inappropriate analogy: "The player is a commodity attribute, we ordered the dish for the Australian lobster, and the result was crayfish, and normal people are going to sue the store." In other words, he felt that Li Jiachao, Huo Qigang and all walks of life in Hong Kong had named Messi to make a statement, and their aggressive posture was the wrong target.

The crux of the matter is that when all parties are not satisfied with the lobster menu and now have to settle accounts with the restaurant, should they target the Miami International team or the organizer of the Hong Kong event, Tatler Asia? It is not possible to expect ordinary fans to understand the division of responsibilities and powers between these two companies in the short term, but I believe that both parties probably had flaws in the communication and cooperation before the incident, and no party has ironclad evidence that can completely clear the responsibility, otherwise it would have been put on the table a long time ago, so why let yourself fall deeper and deeper in the whirlpool of public opinion.

Caption: Messi's every action and expression on the bench that night is now being held accountable by angry fans.

Examine the wording in Huo Qigang's heroic article: "The organizer Tatler claimed that they were also victims, and they only learned about Messi's absence 10 minutes before the end. So on the issue of 40,000 ticket-buying fans and huge commercial interests, did the organizer ask the team leader to provide a professional medical report? Or did the team leader say it?"

Fok Qigang's official capacity is that he is the vice president of the Hong Kong Sports Federation (and the Hong Kong Olympic Committee) and a member of the Legislative Council in the sports sector, and he speaks on behalf of the Hong Kong sports community and Hong Kong fans. It is not difficult to see from the statement that Huo Qigang does not know much about the details of the cooperation between the two sides, so he chooses to quote the statement and throw out questions. On the cusp of public opinion, it is completely legitimate for him to uphold justice for fans as a public figure. However, there is no conclusion on how to determine the ultimate responsibility in the "Messi incident", so Huo Qigang also cleverly named all parties, including Messi himself.

There is also a conspiracy theory that when the organizers and Inter Miami finalized the details of the cooperation, they already knew that Messi would play at one price and not play at another price, in other words, they only paid the price of crayfish, but afterwards condemned the store for failing to serve a plate of Australian dragons - this statement I personally don't think is very credible. Whether Messi plays or not, and even down to how many minutes he plays, is undoubtedly the core focus of contract negotiations in this game, and it is impossible not to fall into black and white. If the above situation really happens, Miami International can publish the terms of the contract as the team and prove Messi's innocence, why let the situation ferment out of control?

So I'm more inclined to believe that the two sides were not rigorous enough to finalize the details in advance, and unintentionally or deliberately left a vague area of "flexible operation", especially for the core detail of whether Messi will play. For example, it is agreed that Messi will play at least 45 minutes in this game (as some media claim to have clues), but in some special circumstances (including but not limited to injury) can be waived. Then, the relevant agreements should be more rigorous - for example, who has the discretion to decide whether the injury affects the appearance, how much time before the start or end of the game at the latest is obliged to decide and disclose, and the official caliber and compensation plan for Messi's inability to play, etc.

Caption: ESPN's Spanish report claims that Messi's failure to appear in Hong Kong was the decision of head coach Martino.

If there is no clear agreement on the above, then according to the convention of sports competitions, whether a player will play or not is completely a "coach's decision", so "the will be outside the king's fate", which is beyond the influence of management, including Beckham. Since it is up to the coach to decide, the coach also has his own "diplomatic rhetoric", and his decision is based on purely competitive factors such as form and injury, and as for how the team should explain to sponsors and partners, it is the management's business. Therefore, it is probably not difficult for you to understand why Miami International coach Martino still stated on February 3 that he "expects Messi to play as many times as possible", because whether Messi will play or not is not completely causally related to the coach's expectations and evaluations the day before the game.

So, is Messi himself responsible for this "collective decision"? I think it is also difficult to escape the blame.

Team Miami International is in the international part of the 2024 preseason schedule from January 30 to February 7. Before the Hong Kong stop, Messi and his team played two consecutive games against the victory team and the crescent team in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia. Although nominally not out of Asia, flying from there to Hong Kong, China, across multiple time zones, is no different from traveling across a continent. Messi made a symbolic seven-minute appearance against Riyadh Victory on February 1, while the match against Kobe Victory in Japan was on February 7. If he skips the Hong Kong leg of the game, Messi will be able to play to the fullest and get a week of rest and adjustment.

Caption: Messi's playing time in the recent preseason games, after the second game in Saudi Arabia, he also played only seven minutes.

This, I believe, is the self-serving but hurtful decision made by the team and Messi after studying the ambiguous cooperation plan. What's more, in terms of absolute strength, the Hong Kong Stars United is the weakest of the four opponents in the Asian tour, even if Messi does not appear, the Miami International team has the confidence to win easily (the final result is true). But how can it be comfortable to say this?

The apology is twisted, does Messi really plan to "mess up"?

What makes fans even more angry is that Messi did not formally and sincerely (at least it seems) to apologize as Ronaldo did when he "released the pigeons" before, and the team and the organizers did not try to make amends. The majority of fans who have been hurt emotionally have quit - Messi, are you really planning to "mess up"?

First of all, it must be clear that although Messi, the core asset of the Miami International team, is still a minority shareholder who participates in dividends from the capital level, he returns to the essence of being just a top worker with a high salary and a little stock, which is not uncommon in large Internet companies. But when it comes to speaking out to the outside world, especially in the face of such complex and sensitive public opinion, or in the big Chinese market, which has a great impact on the team, where do the workers have the right to express their stance at will?

Just look at the announcement made by the tournament organizers through official social media in advance, and you can see what is at stake: "Tatler Asia has teamed up with David Beckham, president and co-owner of CF Miami Inter, and Inter Miami to bring a star-studded football squad to Asia's world city for a special XFEST exhibition match on Sunday, February 4, 2024. This tournament is not only part of his team's first global tour, but also part of our inaugural Tatler XFEST Carnival. ”

Caption: Judging from the promotional video released by Tatler before the game, Beckham is the "main coffee".

It is not difficult to see that Beckham is the main body of cooperation, and then piggybacks on the Miami International team, and Messi happens to be one of them. In the promotional video of the match released later, the protagonist is also Beckham instead of Messi. It's not hard to understand, as Tatler is positioned as a fashion media for a sophisticated luxury lifestyle, and there is no more influential choice in the global football and even sports world than the Beckhams.

In other words, the whole team is here to sing for Boss Bei, and Messi is no exception.

Another detail after the Hong Kong leg is also quite intriguing. Beckham did not travel with the squad to Japan for Inter Miami's match against Vissel Kobe, but flew to Qatar alone to appear in the VIP table of the Asian Cup semi-final between Jordan and South Korea. In Huo Qigang's article, this detail was also mentioned, and he publicly asked whether it was because Beckham had nothing to do with the game in Japan.

But at least it can be inferred that the so-called "apology" happened after they had already played the game in Japan, which can be regarded as the maximum gesture that Messi and the team can sacrifice without slapping the boss in the face. At this time, the cooperation between Tatler Asia and Beckham is probably closed, and although there are still many difficult disputes to solve, most of the details do not seem to be enough to resort to FIFA or relevant legal and arbitration institutions, except for moral condemnation and reputational damage. The apology at this moment is not painful, but it is better than nothing.

Caption: Beckham interacted cordially with Deng Ziqi and other Hong Kong stars at the scene that day, and also gained a lot of shots.

Is it sincere? Not really. This is just a few clumsy dance postures that Messi and the team wore the shackles of public opinion and justice. But does Messi really want to "mess up"? I don't think so. This is just a top worker forced by the capital obscenity that he does not dare to offend, and he can't move, he can't attack, but he still has to force a few sincere shapes. But in the end, capital may not buy it, and the parents are offended.

Conspiracy theories don't have to be, they're just "dishes".

What's more, the "black hand" who tries to highlight the antagonism between Messi and Chinese fans from sensitive political reasons is even more condemnable. If you want to talk about boycotting, Messi not only played in the Bird's Nest in Beijing with the Argentine national team in June last year, but also scored a goal, could it be that after half a year, the perception of China has undergone earth-shaking changes?

But I still support the majority of rational and professional Chinese fans to vent their anger moderately, because in the whole thing, the person concerned is really "dish", so that the whole thing is lost.

The club's decision-makers were overjoyed. In the face of last season's dismal MLS results (second to last in the Eastern Conference) and the rush to re-establish commercial value, the pre-season schedule (especially the international segment) was too full, the players were exhausted, and the event publicity and PR plan could not keep up, and it was completely unable to cope with a tricky situation such as Hong Kong.

Beckham's line between the value of his personal IP and the commercial value of the team is "unclear". The core assets of himself, Messi and the entire Inter Miami team cannot be completely clearly cut, but at least it is necessary to distinguish which is more important and which comes first. If you had told all the fans in advance that this was me Beckham – a long-time retired star who was a successful entrepreneur in a business show, rather than peddling Messi as a core gimmick, I believe the situation would be much different than it is now. Of course, there will be far fewer people buying tickets.

The way Messi and his PR team have responded and handled it has also been a disaster. Although for now, at least in Chinese Internet public opinion, he did carry the blame for the decision-making level of the Miami International team, but as a top IP in football that has not yet passed, there are still many opportunities to save himself in the process. Even a friendlier expression when the camera sweeps by, and a more polite gait when the award ceremony bypasses the chief executive, may keep the situation from falling to the bottom.

Regardless of whether you order crayfish or Australian lobster, what everyone is looking forward to is nothing more than the "dish" that makes your mouth satisfied and comfortable. But now that this whole thing has been handled so "vegetable", to put it bluntly, fans are really more willing to watch the Spring Festival Gala tonight.

Caption: Will there be "national football elements" on the Spring Festival Gala on Chinese New Year's Eve tonight?

This is the last issue of the Lunar New Year, and I wish you a happy Spring Festival and a prosperous Year of the Dragon in advance!