1. The first person to discover Messi’s talent was his grandmother. She took the young Messi to the local club and convinced his parents to buy him a pair of football boots. At the age of 6, Messi joined Newell’s Old Boys. Five years later, shortly before his 11th birthday, his grandmother passed away. That’s why Messi often points to the sky after scoring a goal. He wanted to send words to his beloved grandmother, who discovered his talent and supported him from the days when he was just a shy and short boy.
Lionel…One day you will become the greatest player in the world – Lionel Messi’s grandmother
2. When he first joined Barcelona’s youth team, Messi spoke so little that many of his teammates thought he was mute.
3. Messi’s debut for Barcelona was a friendly against Jose Mourinho’s Porto
4. When Messi was 3 years old, he fell in love with a girl who was a relative of a friend of Messi. He and she promised to be together forever. It seemed like just a child’s nonsense, but now they live together in a happy family with 3 children after many periods of separation and broken relationships. She is Antonella Roccuzzo.
5. Messi is a quiet person. He bought all the houses of his neighbors and even planes are not allowed to fly over Messi’s house area.
6. Messi has a small body and low center of gravity, so he can easily change direction when dribbling and avoid tackles from the opponent, from there he can dribble past 5-6 players of the opposing team and score. The goal against Getafe in 2007, or the goal in the match against Athletic Bilbao in 2015 are typical examples. That is why Messi is called the Atomic Flea – small but extremely dangerous.
7. Messi spoke about his idols in his first interview with Barcelona. They were Diego Maradona, Ronaldinho – who was playing for Barcelona’s first team at the time and finally Pablo Aimar.
8. When Messi went on trial at Barcelona, he juggled an orange 113 times to prove his talent.
9. Because he came to Spain when he was young, in addition to his Argentine nationality, he also has Spanish nationality. He chose to play for the national team of his birth country. If Messi had chosen to play for Spain, he could have won the 2010 World Cup and won the Euros twice in 2008 and 2012.
10. After the match between Argentina and Iceland at the 2018 World Cup, a journalist gave Messi a red ribbon.
”My mother admires you very much, her feelings for you are probably more than her feelings for me. She asked me to send you this ribbon to wish you good luck” – That journalist
And after the Argentina vs Nigeria match, the journalist asked Messi if he still had the ribbon, and Messi pointed to his ankle where the ribbon was. And since then, Leo has carried it with him as a lucky charm.
He once gave it to Philippe Coutinho to encourage his teammate at Barcelona.
And Dybala too
And Lautaro Martinez at Copa America 2021
11. At the 2019 Copa America, in the third-place match between Argentina and Chile, Gary Medel had a rough tackle on Messi, both received red cards and left the field. Afterwards, Medel’s son wanted Messi’s shirt, even though he had just received a kick in the stomach from Medel, he still agreed to give the boy the gift he wanted.
12. A 100-year-old man was a fan of Messi and he wrote down all of Messi’s goals in detail on pieces of paper. Messi video called and thanked him for silently accompanying him all these years.
13. After Messi surpassed Pele’s record for most goals scored for a single club, he gave beer to the goalkeepers he had beaten, with the number of bottles representing the number of goals he had scored against them.
” Now I just wish I wouldn’t have to receive this special gift. Remember Lionel, I trust you ” Gianluigi Buffon
”If you are a goalkeeper and play in La Liga for 2-3 years, you will be able to open a bar” – Filipe Luis
14.
”My father always told me that no matter what happens in the future, Pele is the best. And then I met him at the 2006 World Cup. At that time, I only took one selfie. It was with Messi ” – Jurgen Klopp
15. When Messi was young, he was always the smallest kid on the team and extremely introverted. Once his coach told him ”Hey kid, make a bet with me? Every time you score a goal, I’ll give you a chocolate cookie” At that time, Messi really liked that snack. And from then on, Messi scored about 4-5 goals in every match and the coach kept his promise. When he saw Messi’s true talent, he continued to bet with him, every time Messi scored a header, he would give him 2 cookies. So Messi dribbled past all the opposing defenders including the goalkeeper and lifted the ball up to head the ball into the net. Then he smiled at the coach and held up two fingers and said ”Two”
Messi is physically inferior to his peers.
16. Giorgio Chiellini and Leonardo Bonucci are known as one of the best central defenders in history. They are like brothers. Chiellini once said that ”I know Bonucci better than I know my wife” and in 2017 after the match between Juventus and Barcelona, the two of them fought to swap shirts with Messi.
17.
Paolo Maldini: ”I have had the chance to face many of the greatest players in history. Among them, the best are of course Diego Maradona when he played for Napoli, Ronaldo de Lima when he played for Inter. I have not faced Messi because one time when AC Milan played against Barcelona, he was injured. Thank God for that.”
A journalist: ”Messi is lucky not to have to face you”
Paolo Maldini: ”No. I’m the lucky one”
18. At the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, Messi played extremely well and received the Golden Ball award, but he was still very sad because the Argentina team lost to Germany with the only goal by Mario Gotze in the 113th minute.
”I don’t care about the WC Golden Ball. I’m just sad about the chances we missed. They were the ones who took the initiative in the match so the chances were extremely rare but we missed them all. I don’t care about personal achievements, what I want is to lift the WC Golden Cup with my teammates for the people of Argentina. My pain right now is huge” – Messi
19. Messi’s parents named him after their favorite singer Lionel Richie
20. Bojan Krkic is a distant relative of Messi.
21. Pique once teased Messi when El Pulga first joined Barcelona
”That guy is going to play football with us? Haha, he looks just like my little brother” – Gerard Pique
But after that, their relationship was extremely close until now.
”This year we will win because we have this new guy. He is great” – Gerard Pique
22. Growth hormone deficiency limits Messi’s height. River Plate wanted to sign him but did not want to pay for his treatment. Then Messi went to Barcelona for a trial and impressed everyone. They offered to sign Messi and agreed to pay for his treatment. And that contract was a napkin. From that napkin, countless pages of world football history were written.
23. We all know how scary Messi is from free kicks. Many people even think that he has a higher chance of scoring from free kicks than from penalties. And the person who helped Messi improve his free kicks was none other than Diego Maradona.
24. In a match between Barcelona and AS Roma, Messi scored a goal but he didn’t celebrate and ran to an opponent player who was lying on the ground, that was Lucas Digne. And the following season Digne joined Barcelona
25. ”When we were in the national team training camp preparing for the South American U20 football tournament. Me, Leo, Garay and Formica were sitting around the table. Then I asked him ”What’s your name?”, he said ”Leo”. I continued ”I mean his real name”, Leo laughed and said ”Lionel”. ”What about their last name?” – I continued asking, ”Messi”. Garay and Formica looked at me and said ”You don’t know him?”, then I suddenly thought ”Oh, so that’s the guy”. From then on we became friends and from the 2005 U20 World Cup we have been roommates in the national team until now. Once Messi and I had to go downstairs to use the computer at the reception because our room didn’t have one. At that time the coach made the whole team go back to their rooms before 11 o’clock. There were only 3 minutes left until 11am but Messi was still sending emails. I urged him but he didn’t come back to his room until 10:59. When we rushed back to our room we saw a vending machine so we grabbed some snacks. When we got to the room the assistant coach was waiting for us at the door. I was really shaking because all the snacks were hidden on me. Eventually Leo and I were discovered and he was very angry” – Sergio Aguero
My knowledge is still limited, so if there is any problem, I hope you will give me your comments <3
