Lionel Messi in Beijing for friendly before move to Miami

Argentine superstar Lionel Messi arrived successful Beijing connected Saturday for a affable lucifer earlier leaving a storied European vocation to articulation Major League Soccer broadside Inter Miami arsenic a escaped agent.

His accomplishment was announced successful a station connected the organizer International Football Invitation's authoritative Weibo societal media tract with a video of players stepping disconnected a plane, up of Thursday's Argentina-Australia lucifer successful the Chinese capital's precocious rebuilt Workers' Stadium.

Messi, who lifted the World Cup successful Qatar successful December and is wide considered to beryllium 1 of the game's all-time greats, confirmed this week helium volition permission French champions Paris St Germain for the U.S. league.

This is the Argentina captain's seventh sojourn to China and his archetypal since 2017.

He has received a fervent invited connected each of his erstwhile visits to China, which has a immense shot instrumentality basal contempt the struggles of the men's nationalist team, who person played astatine the World Cup lone once.

Australia and Argentina past met astatine the 2022 World Cup successful Qatar successful the circular of 16, wherever Messi was among the scorers arsenic his squad won 2-1.