Messi's Argentina plays for cut price in India to boost fan base

Lionel Messi’s Argentina will play two exhibition matches in India and Bangladesh at a discount rate as his team tries to expand its fan base in one of the world’s most populous regions.

Argentina, a two-time soccer World Cup winner, agreed to play Venezuela in Kolkata, India, on Sept. 2 before moving to Bangladesh capital Dhaka to meet Nigeria four days later. World Eleven SA, the company that owns the rights to Argentina’s exhibition rights, said it promised to take the best national roster and reduced its asking price.

“We have made a good price for them because we are interested in opening up new markets,” World Eleven President Guillermo Tofoni said in a telephone interview. “It’s interesting because our idea is to play with our top players including Messi because we see lots of opportunities in India.”

Messi, a double FIFA World Player of the Year, is likely to be joined by players including Javier Mascherano, his club mate at Barcelona, which won the European Cup and Spanish championship last season. Manchester City striker Carlos Tevez is also set to participate.

Tofoni and Dharamdutt Pandey, chief executive officer of Kolkata-based Celebrity Management Group, which bought the game rights, declined to say how much the deal is worth. In 2009, Tofoni said World Eleven charged about $1 million for an Argentina game. Pandey’s group arranged an Indian promotional tour for Argentine soccer icon Diego Maradona in 2008.

India’s economic expansion is the second-fastest after China among the world’s largest economies amid rising incomes in a nation of 1.2 billion people.

Dominant Sport
The $1.3 trillion economy grew 7.8 per cent last quarter from a year earlier after having expanded 8.3 per cent in the previous three-month period, according to government figures. Bangladesh’s population is about 150 million.

While cricket is both countries’ dominant sport, rivals such as soccer and basketball are trying to get the attention of its expanding middle class. Four-time European champion Bayern Munich attracted 120,000 spectators when it played an exhibition there in May 2008. The National Basketball Association last month announced a partnership with India’s largest media company, Times Group, and also sponsors a multicity league.

India and Bangladesh are ranked 145th and 163rd in world ruling body FIFA’s rankings. That’s below the likes of the Faroe Islands, Turkmenistan and Gambia.

‘War Footing’
“Having Messi playing in our country would be a dream come true for the football lovers of our nation,” Pandey said. “Cricket in India is very big, we are the world champions, but India at the same time has football followers too. Unfortunately, we do not get the best of football in our country live.”

Many teams are put off going to India because of concerns about its soccer infrastructure. Madan Mitra, sports minister of the state of West Bengal, said the tour may be in jeopardy because Kolkata’s Salt Lake Stadium was in “terrible condition.”

“Unless we work on a war footing, the city will miss out on seeing Messi in action,” he said. Pandey said the facility only needed “some touch-ups.”

World Eleven officials and representatives from the Argentine soccer federation plan to travel to India in the coming weeks, Tofoni said.