‘Where is he?’: Lionel Messi and David Beckham booed by angry fans in Hong Kong
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Argentine talisman Lionel Messi and the owner of Inter Miami were booed in Hong Kong after Messi was not seen in action on the pitch.
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The Hong Kong government were also disappointed by the fact that Messi was missing among Inter Miami players.
‘Regarding Messi not playing the match today, the Government, as well as all football fans, are extremely disappointed about the organiser’s arrangement. The organiser owes all football fans an explanation.’
The fans displeasure turned to boos and thumbs downs when the final 20 minutes arrived without any sight of Messi. A Hong Kong female fan, Christer Leung, who had named her child after Messi, later said the following to CNN:
‘I think everyone’s disappointed.
‘It was unexpected, I thought he would feature for at least five minutes. Otherwise we wouldn’t have paid the ticket prices to get in here. You heard the mood, which was I think justified but uncalled for at the same time.
‘This whole Messi in Hong Kong thing has been building up for quite some time. Everyone was so excited and there was so much drama with the tickets.
‘The training session [on Saturday] was also quite disappointing because he didn’t really do much and it was cut short. Everyone expected today would be a little bit more, so everyone is going to be disappointed.
‘But, as his supporter for a long time, I fully respect the decision not to play him if he is really suffering, because he’s 36.
‘I blame Inter Miami scheduling so many friendlies in so many different places. They should have invited everyone to come to America. I guess they wanted to grow the brand internationally, which makes sense.’
Inter Miami’s coach Tata Martino explained why Messi did not play.
‘We understand the reception from the fans towards the absence of Leo and Luis.
‘This was a decision made together with our medical team. We checked their physical wellbeing and they risked sustaining an injury if they went onto the pitch so they couldn’t play.
‘We understand the disappointment from the fans and we ask for their forgiveness. We wish we could have played them for even a short while, but the risk was too big.’
The coach went in-depth to explain the situation that disqualified the Argentine from appearing against the Hong Kong team.
‘Leo has an inflammation of the adductor as we saw from the images of his muscles. We were expecting an improvement, but the situation has been there for many days.’
‘We were checking it constantly with the medical team, and we also had to consider our obligations with the upcoming MLS [Major League Soccer]. So we came to the conclusion not to play Messi in the match.
‘In reality, we have been assessing Leo’s condition day-by-day. Yesterday [Saturday] he was in the final training [session], and we assessed it in the hotel until this morning. The decision was not made until the afternoon.’
Though Inter beat their opponents 4–1, the fans who paid the average of $133 for for the match were disappointed.
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