While France's Ligue 1 is basically a farmer's league, La Liga in Spain is definitely a top 2 or 3 league in the world. In Messi's prime, Spanish teams (Barcelona and Real Madrid) won 7 of 10 Champions League Finals (Messi winning four). La Liga is much tougher than the Bundesliga in Germany, where Bayern Munich mostly dominates minnows. I'd like to have seen him play in Italy (he is ethnically largely Italian), but La Liga is a top league.