#18: Messi’s Mega Move to Inter Miami

Hello my beautiful students and welcome back to English News Pod, the best way for you to learn practical English through the news. I’m your host and teacher, Caroline. 

Today, we have an amazing piece of news for all you soccer enthusiasts out there. We will be discussing Lionel Messi’s move to Inter Miami. You can find a full transcript of this podcast episode in the description. 

It's been officially announced that the seven-time Ballon d'Or winner, Lionel Messi, is heading over to the Major League Soccer (MLS) to kickstart his career with Inter Miami. The Messi effect, as we call it, took immediate effect and made a huge impact. Let's dissect this a bit. Social media platforms exploded with the news. Ticket prices for upcoming matches skyrocketed, and fixtures sold out almost instantly! And here's the crazy part - all this happened before Messi even signed a contract! 

Now, Messi moved from Paris Saint-Germain, or PSG, on a free transfer. Just to put things in perspective, Messi was ranked second in 2023 on Forbes' list of the world's highest-paid athletes with earnings up to $130 million. Inter Miami and MLS had to be quite creative to lure Messi to the league. They constructed a unique deal structure, a two-and-a-half-year contract worth up to $60 million per season, making it a grand total of $150 million from salary, signing bonus, and equity in the team. 

This whopping sum makes Messi the highest-paid athlete in the US. Now, here's where things get really interesting. The deal also includes unusual revenue sharing agreements with big brands like Adidas and Apple. For instance, Messi gets a cut of the revenue from new subscribers to Apple TV’s MLS Season Pass. Now, such a deal has never been offered to athletes in any sport. But then again, this is Messi – a player who pulls in a lot of customers and viewers for the MLS. One question that remains unanswered is, will this precedent inspire other iconic athletes to demand similar contracts?

One more time, but this time faster...

Let’s take a look at some grammar:

1. ‘Enthusiast’ - Enthusiast is a noun and is someone who is excited by a subject or shows a lot of interest in a subject. Sometimes, you may hear the phrase ‘showing enthusiasm’. In this news story, we were discussing soccer enthusiasts. 
2. ‘Exploded’ - We mentioned that "Social media platforms exploded with the news". In this context, 'exploded' means that the news spread very quickly and received a lot of attention.
3. ‘Fixtures’ - The term 'fixtures', which we used when talking about the upcoming matches, refers to scheduled games or contests in sports.
4. ‘Lure’ - When we said that Inter Miami and MLS had to 'lure' Messi, we meant that they had to attract or tempt him into joining them. In this context, ‘lure’ is a verb, and is similar to the verbs ‘convince’ and ‘persuade’. 
5. ‘Precedent’ - 'precedent' refers to an earlier event or action that is regarded as an example or guide for future similar circumstances. For example, you will hear the phrase ‘precedent setting’ in law. In our news story, Messi's unique contract could set a 'precedent' for other athletes, meaning that other athletes could demand large contracts like Messi’s in the future.

That wraps us up for today. If you liked this podcast, please subscribe and follow. Thanks for listening, and I will see you soon for more news in English!