But is a special contract really that meaningful? I mean, the club can easily give him a special reward or position given that he is a club legend (despite some drama around his exit). Feels like a waste of recruitment if the goal is just to hype the new stadium, let him sit on the bench, and then retire. It's not like you have to honor your greatest player ever that way.
Well, I'm not a Barca or Messi fan so that's probably why I don't understand why a special contract is meaningful. Speaking from a practical perspective giving him a one-in-a-lifetime medal plus tons of money is great too imo.
It doesn’t make sense looking at a sporting level but I don’t think they are actually looking at it from this perspective rather they are looking at from the monetary perspective ( we all know Barcelona are looking for money from all angle), just imagine how the attendance will be on his second debut for the club it will definitely generate large ticket sales, not to talk of the Jersey sales I think they will make excessive profits on that too, remember the sale PSG had in his first season.
As for him staying on the bench I don’t think the contract will even be for a long term I think it will be all those short contracts offered to MLS players when the league is on break, this can be for just six months