{"id":15029,"date":"2025-11-11T14:05:20","date_gmt":"2025-11-11T12:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/messi-visits-barcas-revamped-camp-nou-hopes-to-return\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:27:24","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:27:24","slug":"messi-visits-barcas-revamped-camp-nou-hopes-to-return","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/messi-visits-barcas-revamped-camp-nou-hopes-to-return\/","title":{"rendered":"Messi visits Barca&#8217;s revamped Camp Nou, hopes to return"},"content":{"rendered":"<div dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: right;\"><span style=\"font-family: var(--global--font-secondary); font-size: var(--global--font-size-base);\">Lionel Messi expressed his wish to one day return to Barcelona&#8217;s Camp Nou on Monday, having made a brief visit to see the newly revamped stadium where he spent 21 years of his illustrious career.<\/span><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">\nThe 38-year-old Argentine World Cup winner, who joined Barca&#8217;s youth academy at age 13 and went on to become the club&#8217;s all-time top scorer with 672 goals in 778 appearances, left the Catalan side in 2021 when they could not make it financially viable to keep him.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">Having won 10 LaLiga titles, four Champions League crowns and three Club World Cups with Barca, Messi now plays for Inter Miami after two years with Paris St Germain.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>Barca reopened the Camp Nou on Friday, 895 days after its closure, unveiling a revamped stadium by staging an open training session attended by 21 795 fans.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;Last night, I returned to a place that I miss with all my heart. A place where I was immensely happy, where you made me feel a thousand times like the happiest person in the world,&#8221; the eight-times Ballon d&#8217;Or winner wrote on Instagram on Monday.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">&#8220;I hope that one day I can return, and not just to say goodbye as a player, as I never got to do.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>Messi extended his contract with Inter Miami in October, and has previously said that the Major League Soccer club would likely be his last.<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;You&#8217;re always welcome at your home, Leo,&#8221; Barca posted on X.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14870,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-15029","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Messi extended his contract with Inter Miami in October.","published_date":null,"news_description":"Messi extended his contract with Inter Miami in October.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/15029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/15029\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19442,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/15029\/revisions\/19442"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=15029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}