The organizer of the friendly match between the Hong Kong championship team and the Inter Miami club, Tatler Asia, will return 50% of the cost of tickets purchased through official channels to spectators. This is stated in a statement from Tatler Asia, as cited by TASS.
A friendly match between the Hong Kong national team and Inter Miami took place in Hong Kong on February 4 and ended in a victory for the American club with a score of 4:1. Over 38 thousand fans attended the match. Midfielder of the Turkmenistan national team Ruslan Mingazov played for the Hong Kong national team.
“We apologize to everyone who was disappointed by the football match between the Hong Kong team and Inter Miami,” the statement said. As noted, under the terms of the contract, Inter Miami promised that its key players - Lionel Messi, Jordi Alba, Sergio Busquets and Luis Suarez - would have to play for 45 minutes if not injured... But what upsets us is this a seeming lack of respect for the fans. When we learned that Messi would not play, we turned to the owners and management of Inter Miami with a request to convince him to stand up, talk to the audience and explain why he could not play. He didn't. The fact that Messi and Suarez played in Japan on February 7 feels like another slap in the face, the statement said.
Organizers stressed that they had invested millions of dollars and months of hard work into bringing a world-class event to Hong Kong.
“We have been in consultation with the government to resolve this issue. We will not shirk our responsibility as organizers, and therefore Tatler Asia will offer a 50% refund to everyone who purchased tickets through official channels. Detailed information about the return process will be made public in a separate message by mid-March, the document says.
As the South China Morning Post previously reported, the Hong Kong Consumer Committee received over 1 thousand complaints from city residents and tourists due to the situation with Messi's absence from the field during a friendly match. The total amount of claims exceeded $1 million.
In an interview with Turkmenportal, Mingazov explained how Messi felt about missing the friendly match in Hong Kong.
