At the beginning, I didn’t pay much attention to the Messi incident, but I found that after a few days, the matter was still fermenting and had the potential to escalate.
It can be certain that mainland Chinese companies currently using Messi as their spokespersons must be feeling extremely uneasy, considering whether continuing to use Messi as their advertising representative will spark controversy. In short, there will definitely be negative impacts on the commercial interests of these companies.
It can be inferred that this incident is a commercial disaster for Messi. Unless there is a clear resolution to this matter and mainland Chinese fans and the public are satisfied with the answers, Messi’s commercial interests and blueprint in China have already been prematurely marked with an end. This also applies to Beckham and Miami International.
However, Miami International may not have had many plans to target China from the beginning, as China may not have been their targeted market. As for Beckham, he actually consoled fans on the scene after the Hong Kong match. Although he is also a football superstar, he is after all a “previous generation” player who has long lost the influence Messi still holds. Therefore, all arrows point to Messi, and all consequences will be borne by Messi. This may even affect the level of support for the Argentine football team in China—mainland fans have always had a special affection for the Argentine team over the past few decades.
Some analysts suggest that Messi’s absence may have political considerations—he tries to stay away from politics as much as possible. Implicitly, with the ongoing geopolitical tensions between China and the US, coupled with the factor of Argentina’s newly elected right-wing populist president Javier Milei, Messi feels that Hong Kong is somewhat sensitive and does not want to be involved in controversy in any form—even including a photo with the Chief Executive. Alternatively, Messi may not have considered it, but Beckham and Miami International had similar considerations.
However, this analysis is unreasonable. Firstly, countless foreign companies are operating normally in mainland China and Hong Kong, with many prominent entrepreneurs (including top American entrepreneurs) coming to China and meeting with Chinese government leaders. A football team, a football player, engaging in sports, which are generally considered to be apolitical, can legitimately claim that their actions have nothing to do with politics. Even if criticized by unfriendly voices, they can come up with countless reasons to exonerate themselves, and they do not need to consider political factors.
Secondly, if political factors were really considered, there would be no need to “stir up trouble” in Hong Kong. Since coming to Hong Kong implies that they do not believe there are any political problems.
Thirdly, even if they did consider political factors and received certain “instructions” or “hints”, fearing being implicated and sensationalized, it would not hinder Messi from sincerely communicating with fans and the public after the match, expressing apologies, and avoiding losing out commercially. Fourthly, if they do indeed care about political factors, the behavior of Messi and the team has angered mainland fans and the public, escalating into a larger event. This is when politics truly become involved.
Messi, Beckham, and Miami International are all commercialized sports organizations and platforms. What they least want to see is their commercial interests being compromised by political factors. “Money talks”, like the vast majority of companies, they would prefer to bypass politics for commercial purposes—especially since they are sports organizations, they can invoke the spirit of borderless sports.
So, what is the root cause of the Messi incident? It is misjudging both the political and commercial accounts. And the reason for misjudging the commercial account is also because of misjudging the political account.
This can be seen from Messi’s “official” response on Weibo.
In the original Spanish text of Messi’s official reply, “Hola a todos mis fans en China y Hong Kong!” (“Hello to all my fans in China and Hong Kong!”), China and Hong Kong are mentioned in parallel. In the Chinese version, the Chinese team (or agency) performed a political “revision”, changing “China and Hong Kong” to “mainland China and Hong Kong SAR”, thinking that this would suffice, but the original Spanish text remained unchanged. Messi posted on Weibo around 6 p.m. on February 7, explaining the absence controversy to mainland China and Hong Kong fans.
Mentioning China and Hong Kong in parallel is a common practice for many foreigners/foreign companies: they consider China and Hong Kong as two “countries”. In their vocabulary or cognition, a “country” does not necessarily imply a “sovereign state”; it could simply mean a “region”. Therefore, Scotland, the Cayman Islands, etc., can all be considered “countries”. For most commercial organizations, this wording does not inherently signify anything: it is not a political judgment, nor does it have a specific political direction. However, when this phrasing reaches mainland China, it can cause controversy, and organizations operating in China will try to avoid it (for example, by using “Hong Kong, PRC” and similar terms). From this detail, it can be seen that Messi’s official team lacked awareness of this issue; while the Chinese team thought to revise the Chinese text, they stopped there.
This does not necessarily indicate that Messi has any further political judgments or orientations; it merely points to a more practical, more fundamental issue, namely, they really believe that Hong Kong and mainland China are two relatively independent markets with no direct or only limited connection. Beckham and Miami International may have made the same judgment, and likewise, the organizers Tatler (“Trendy,” a British magazine) may have made the same misjudgment. This does not mean that they think the Hong Kong and mainland China markets are disconnected; it simply means that they believe the Hong Kong market may “overflow”, covering a wider range than just Hong Kong, for example, being able to cover the Greater Bay Area in ticket sales. But that’s all: Hong Kong is still Hong Kong.
This misjudgment led them (Messi/Miami International) to believe that this was just a market of 7 million people, or more precisely, just a “market of 7 million+”. This made Messi and the team “careless”: the temporarily “resting” sportsmanship they painstakingly cultivated—”This is just a market of 7 million people, we can handle it, although not very professionally. But after all, energy is limited—we should still focus our limited energy on the Japanese market of 120 million people.” They probably really didn’t expect this market of 7 million people to be connected to the mainland Chinese market of 1.4 billion people, and they certainly didn’t expect Messi’s appearance in Japan to further excite mainland Chinese fans and the public. They found themselves unintentionally stepping into the PR crisis they least wanted to step into.
Behind this commercial misjudgment lies, of course, a deep political misjudgment and cultural misjudgment.
After all, Messi is just an athlete. I believe his sportsmanship and professionalism are unquestionable, but I also believe that his persona and image have been cultivated and elevated to a pedestal. In fact, he is just an ordinary person, out to make some money and fame. But playing friendlies all over the world is also a bit of a stretch. He doesn’t really need to showcase his sportsmanship globally. Plainly speaking, it’s about making some extra money before retiring—not just appearance fees, but also advertising fees. His managers, agents surely see him as a money tree and are trying every means to get more eggs from this golden goose. He must feel uncomfortable being pushed around, but there’s nothing he can do about it.
Acting every day is exhausting. Messi’s choice may be to minimize his commitments. In the end, he chose to “take it easy” in this Asian market—Hong Kong—which has only 7 million people and is relatively unknown in football circles.
It can be certain that his managers and agents did not provide him with the best advice regarding the Hong Kong market.
This is the essence of the problem. Under a commercial misjudgment, Messi’s commercial and personal branding chains’ weakest link was exposed.
So, can Messi turn the tide in China? I tend to give an affirmative answer: as long as he expresses enough sincerity and puts in enough effort, Chinese fans and the public will forgive him. For example:
– He sincerely apologizes to fans in Hong Kong and mainland China.
– He promises to play matches in Hong Kong and the mainland, even committing to playing the full 90 minutes.
– He commits to a series of charitable activities related to Chinese football and public welfare.
– He publicly makes some friendly remarks about mainland China and Hong Kong.
If he can do the above, I believe that as soon as tickets go on sale, they will sell out instantly, and the venue will be packed. Mainland fans and the public will forgive Messi. He can also salvage his commercial value in the mainland market. Of course, this is something that many of Messi’s critics (especially those of Cristiano Ronaldo, it is said) would not want to see.
But whether Messi will do this is uncertain:
– After all, football is a team sport, and he needs the support of an entire team—scheduling and unified action are not so easily arranged.
– This requires great motivation: for example, 1) commercial motivation—Messi believes he cannot abandon the Chinese market. But Messi may really not lack money, so giving up might mean giving up; 2) value motivation—he believes he owes mainland fans a moral obligation and needs to make amends. I tend to think that Messi doesn’t have much value motivation: if he did, he would have come out immediately to appease Hong Kong fans at the scene or after the match. He ignored Hong Kong fans, which is actually his true nature; 3) political motivation—because the Argentine side wants to maintain a certain aspect of Sino-Argentine relations, they ask Messi to step forward. This may not happen immediately, but it may happen in the future. In the past, Messi was a plus for Sino-Argentine relations. Now, he has become a “minus”. In such a scenario, Messi first needs to reset his score to zero, and then make goodwill gestures.
Finally, this incident tells us:
– Everyone makes mistakes. As long as it’s a human, mistakes are inevitable.
– The easiest time to make mistakes is often when one is most careless and light-hearted. So we must always be vigilant.
– Even if a mistake is made and the consequences are severe, there may still be opportunities for redemption.
Today is New Year’s Eve. The excitement of mainland fans and the public over the Messi incident is just a pastime from the past year.
Wishing everyone a happy Chinese New Year, full of vitality!
This article is from the WeChat public account “Chairman Rabbit.”