Former Tottenham and Republic of Ireland striker Robbie Keane wants Lionel Messi to move to the Premier League and believes Manchester City would be the ‘obvious choice’ for the Barcelona star.
The Argentine’s future at Camp Nou has once again come into question following Barca’s embarrassing 8-2 defeat to Bayern Munich in the Champions League.
Reports claim that Messi has told the board he wants to leave the club unless there is a complete overhaul this summer.
The 33-year-old pitched in with 25 goals and 21 assists in La Liga last season, however, it wasn’t enough to stop rivals Real Madrid winning the league title.
Messi linked up with City boss Guardiola during their time at Camp Nou to great effect, winning the league three times as well as the Champions League twice.
The Manchester club have been previously linked with the winger and Keane says if the Barca icon was to sensationally swap Spain for England, City would be his likely destination.
‘It’s a tough one, listen he’s done everything at Barcelona that he needs to do,’ Keane told beIN Sports.
‘Selfishly, I’d love to see him in the Premier League, I think he’d be great, the Premier League is one of the best leagues in the world. The obvious choice would be probably Man City because of Guardiola and the relationship he has with him.
‘Will he come? Who knows. But certainly there’s a lot of unrest there you can obviously tell that. That would have hurt them to lose 8-2 against Bayern Munich.
‘This is an ageing Barcelona team, they need three or four really top, top players. Are they going to bring them in this year? Has Messi had the conversation, are you going to bring back Neymar? Are you going to bring these big players in here that are going to challenge like we did a few years ago?
‘This season, last season they haven’t really been themselves in terms of how we know Barcelona how they play and how they want to play.
‘Even though Messi’s still been at his standards in terms of what he does with goals and assists, so I’d like to see him over here for a few seasons in the Premier League.’
