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“My first memory of Lionel Messi? That would probably be sitting next to him on the bus to Leon XIII high school in Barcelona,” says Toronto FC midfielder Victor Vazquez.
From the age of 13, Vazquez was Lionel Messi’s team-mate at La Masia, the fabled youth academy of FC Barcelona. And they quickly became close friends.
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“I remember clearly, as if it was yesterday, us both sitting there with a Discman in our hand. Leo loved telling me about his life in Argentina, and his Discman was full of cumbia songs (traditional South American music). He’d play them for me all the time, and I’d do the same for him with Spanish music.”
Yet during the Messi family’s early days in Spain — in the very early 2000s — the 120 square metre flat Barcelona had provided for them was not always a happy home.
The apartment was on Gran Via Carlos III, a busy avenue in Les Corts, a 10-minute walk from the Camp Nou and the old La Masia building. It seemed the perfect place to get used to life at the club, but Messi’s family was struggling.
Young Lionel used to lock himself in his room, enduring the ritual of administering the growth hormone injections Barcelona had paid for as one of the conditions for securing his signature. Whenever he ventured out of his room, Messi, in his mid-teens at the time, will have noticed that the move from Argentina to Spain had put strain on his parents too. His mother Celia in particular struggled to adapt to life in the heart of a bustling city over 6,000 miles from home.
It got to the point where father Jorge asked his son whether he wanted to take the easy way out and head back home. The young Messi was absolutely determined to stay in Barcelona, and so they reached a challenging compromise they hoped would work best for the family as a whole — Jorge stayed with his son in Spain, while Celia moved back to Rosario.
Unlike his parents, Messi had an outlet for his problems.
“From day one, it was crazy how good he was out on the pitch,” recalls Vazquez. “Me and the other players in the academy — like Gerard Pique and Cesc Fabregas — were always talking about how incredible a player he was. We couldn’t believe how good he was, and the whole dressing room agreed we had to do everything we could to help Leo adapt to living in Barcelona.
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“In the dressing room, for a start, he was so shy. He would sit alone in a corner of the locker room before training, and then after the session he’d shower quickly and leave for home. It was normal, of course, after such a big change of life.
“I ended up getting along very well with Leo. We sat together on the bus, in school, in training or wherever we ended up, listening to music. That’s how Messi started finding his feet in our team.”
The Messis first learned they would be moving to Barcelona on December 14, 2000. That was the day that agent Horacio Gaggioli met with Barcelona scout and former assistant manager Carles Rexach, and local agent Josep Maria Minguella at the Pompeia tennis club. The meeting went so well that Rexach ended up frantically drafting Messi’s first contract with the club on a napkin he had taken from the bar.
“My lawyers said this was a valid document from a legal perspective, and it changed our lives,” Gaggioli said years after a meeting that changed the course of football history.
In the years that followed, Gaggioli also settled in Barcelona, and began representing other players — including Vazquez.
“Horacio would always ask me to help Leo with anything I could, to make him feel like Barcelona was as much his home as it was mine. There was always a risk. He was a young kid going through a life-changing phase, moving away from home. He could have easily said ‘Dad, I don’t want to be here anymore’.
“Fortunately, thanks to the hard work of the players, the club, and of course Leo himself, that never happened.”
Messi made Barcelona his home.
Family struggles aside, Messi had good reason to feel he was in the best possible place to fulfil his dreams of becoming a football superstar.
His rise through the Barcelona youth ranks was one of the fastest the club had ever seen. In his first full season he scored 38 goals in 31 games while playing with the under-16s.
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It quickly became apparent that playing against boys his own age wasn’t much of a challenge for Messi, so in 2003-04, Barcelona moved the 16-year-old to the under-18s. But not for long. There, he set a club record that has not been equalled to this day: he played for five different Barcelona teams in one season.
After three games with the under-18s, he was promoted to the under-19s. Even there, the forward was head and shoulders above any opponent, which caught the eye of the first-team manager Frank Rijkaard.
By November 2003, Rijkaard had called up Messi to join the first team for a friendly game against Porto, then managed by Jose Mourinho. He impressed so much during a 15-minute cameo as a substitute that he never returned to the academy, instead spending the rest of the season with Barcelona’s B and C teams.
In 2004-05 he joined up with Barcelona B full time, but once again didn’t hang around too long. On October 16, 2004, Messi made his competitive debut for Barcelona’s senior team aged 17 years, three months and 22 days, coming on as a substitute in a La Liga match at Espanyol.
Messi featured for the first team a further eight times that season, scoring his first goal for the club in the final minute of the season with an expertly lobbed finish against Albacete at Camp Nou. He also played 17 games for Barcelona B in Spain’s third tier, scoring six goals.
“I remember quite well the last game of that season,” the then-Barcelona B manager Pere Gratacos recalls. “We beat Osasuna 4-0 and Messi delivered a masterclass. I took him off in the 87th minute just for him to get a standing ovation. I knew he was not going to come back with us, and deserved to say goodbye to the Mini Estadi (Barcelona B’s former home ground).”
Messi was already on the cusp of superstardom, even if he probably didn’t know it. He certainly didn’t act like it.
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“Even when he started playing for the first team, Leo was spending every Saturday morning he could at the academy, watching the under-18s and under-19s play,” says Vazquez.
“He knew most of us. The guys he started playing with were still there and he wanted to keep track of how we were doing. He didn’t forget about us. I think it was his way of staying close to the guys who helped him when times were tougher for him and his family.
“Later on, when he was a superstar, that stopped, but by then Messi couldn’t live a normal life anymore; he couldn’t walk around Barcelona freely and visit his old mates like he used to do. His lifestyle needed to change.”
The change in lifestyle began as soon as he was crowned player of the tournament as Argentina won the 2005 Under-20 World Cup. Weeks later, he put in a performance for the ages in the traditional pre-season Joan Gamper trophy, in which Barcelona hosted Fabio Capello’s Juventus.
Messi was subbed off 10 minutes before the final whistle with a packed Camp Nou chanting “Messi, Messi, Messi” as he applauded. Little did that crowd know that this would eventually become a trademark act of reverence for the next 16 years.
“It would be a crime to think Messi does not have a place in this Barcelona squad,” declared Spanish newspaper El Pais in their write-up of the game. The teenager ran riot, tormenting the likes of Gianluca Pessotto, Fabio Cannavaro, Jonathan Zebina and Giuliano Giannichedda with an endless showcase of dribbles, turns and flicks. Messi drew bookings from three members of a Juve team that had won the Serie A title just months before, and set up Andres Iniesta for one of the goals.
The final score was 2-2, but that wasn’t what anybody would remember from the game.
“I’ve never seen a player with as much quality at Lionel Messi’s age,” Capello stated after the game. During the match, the Italian even asked Rijkaard if Juve could take Messi on loan for the season ahead. Rijkaard burst out laughing.
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Messi was an 18 year old with the world at his feet, but he would have to wait to make his first La Liga appearance of 2005-06. Deportivo Alaves legal advisor and then-La Liga vice president Javier Tebas complained that Barcelona had not correctly applied for Messi’s Spanish citizenship, and that should not be allowed to play (at the time, teams were only allowed to register three non-EU players for La Liga, and Barcelona already had Ronaldinho, Samuel Eto’o and Rafa Marquez).
The 18 year old was forced to watch from the stands as his team made a stuttering start to the season. Barca were seventh in La Liga when, in late September 2005, Messi was finally granted his Spanish citizenship and allowed to play. His first ‘full’ season as a first-team player was hugely impressive: 25 games, 13 goal contributions — eight goals and five assists — as Barca won their second successive league title. But perhaps the most memorable moment was a jaw-dropping display against Chelsea in the Champions League quarter-finals, when his trickery got left-back Asier del Horno sent off for a clumsy challenge.
The season ended on a sour note for Messi after he suffered a hamstring injury in the second leg of that tie and missed the Champions League final against Arsenal. Messi believed he was fit and ready to feature in the Paris final, but Rijkaard did not want to take any risks. Messi was said to be furious and was reluctant to celebrate too wildly on the pitch following Barcelona’s 2-1 win.
Despite that, Messi was enjoying an incredibly happy period in his life. Barcelona’s first-team dressing room, full of established world-class stars such as Ronaldinho, Eto’o, Xavi, Deco and Carles Puyol, had welcomed him with open arms.
Deco and Ronaldinho in particular were close allies, with the latter acting as an older brother figure. The Brazilian superstar saw in Messi the kid he once was — he too had been a prodigious talent who made his debut at 16 and was playing regular top-flight football by 18. He advised Messi to move out of Barcelona to Castelldefels, a suburb on the southwestern outskirts of the city. Messi promptly bought his first property there, on the same street as the Brazilian.
“Sometimes I go by his place and pick him up to go for a drink, or we stay playing video games,” Messi said in 2007.
Castelldefels is nestled between the Mediterranean Sea and a cluster of small mountains. Closer to the hills, there’s a more exclusive area that many Barcelona stars have chosen to to make their home in recent times.
It is where Messi still has a house to this day, and is in fact the area with the third-highest number of Argentinian residents in Spain. Messi has always insisted this was not the reason he moved there, but has previously spoken of his pleasure in bumping into his compatriots.
If anything that 2006 Champions League win — Barcelona’s first in 14 years — signalled the end of an era. Things quickly disintegrated.
They may have only lost the 2006-07 La Liga title to Real Madrid on goals scored, but they crashed out of the Champions League to Liverpool at the relatively-early last-16 stage. Although they did better in reaching the semi-finals in 2007-08, they once again surrendered the league title to Real Madrid, finishing the season in third place, behind Villarreal.
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While Messi kept progressing and improving his numbers season by season, concerns emerged inside the club over the off-pitch behaviour of some of their other stars. There were suggestions of late nights out in the city and missed training sessions, with Ronaldinho bearing the brunt of the criticism.
With a perception that standards at the club were dropping and the work ethic was not quite right, senior figures inside Barcelona were worried Ronaldinho’s ‘adopted kid’ may be about to go off the rails. The club knew Messi was occasionally joining Ronaldinho and his friends on their nights out and felt the need to nip things in the bud.
Rijkaard was sacked in 2008, a decision that provided the platform for perhaps the biggest turning point for Messi and the club: the appointment of Pep Guardiola.
This landmark in Barcelona’s history came along with the promise of drastic changes to the squad. The first of those was getting rid of some big names and big personalities —Ronaldinho (to AC Milan), Deco (Chelsea) and Eto’o (Inter). The Cameroonian, unlike the other two, did at least last long enough to play in Guardiola’s first season.
With those big hitters gone, Guardiola assured Messi he was a central part of his masterplan. The Argentine inherited Ronaldinho’s No 10 shirt and Guardiola allowed him to join Argentina at the 2008 Summer Olympics while Barcelona were already in pre-season as a gesture of goodwill to his new star.
The story that follows has been well-documented: the birth of arguably the best football team the game has ever seen, the explosion of Messi as the most dominant player in the world, in a team that played with an unprecedented style and made greatness appear almost routine. Led by the Argentinian, that side helped establish the Barcelona brand across the world.
At the end of 2008-09, Messi had totted up 38 goals and 19 assists in 51 games. He led Barcelona to the Copa del Rey, La Liga and Champions League titles. He won his first Ballon d’Or, and played his first football game as a false nine — a position with which he would reinvent football.
In his personal life, Messi was also happier than ever, with his now-wife Antonela Roccuzzo moving from Rosario to Barcelona permanently to finally kickstart their relationship. The pair both were born and raised in Rosario, and eventually met through Messi’s best friend in the Newell’s Old Boys academy, Lucas Scaglia.
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Scaglia was Roccuzzo’s cousin. Messi used to spend his summer holidays with Scaglia, and first met Antonela when he was nine years old. When the Messis moved to Barcelona, he still kept in contact, but their relationship didn’t begin until after he had made it into the first team, when she decided to follow him to Spain.
It was going to take a lot to stop Messi from here, with his manager’s demanding nature conjuring a drive and determination that not even his closest friends at Barcelona saw coming.
“By the time Messi was playing for Barcelona B we could all already see he had everything to become one of the world’s best,” says Vazquez. “But we didn’t expect this final evolution of becoming an absolute beast, with seasons scoring 50 goals and delivering 30 assists, demanding he show the best version of himself in every single game. It was just unbelievable.”
Vazquez shared the first three years of the Guardiola era with Messi, playing mainly for the B team from 2008 to 2011, but also earning his first-team debut and scoring in the Champions League.
“It was the perfect timing for him. He experienced the challenges of those tough times in the last years of Rijkaard, but he was still very young and the arrival of Guardiola lifted him. Guardiola added a couple of things to his game, and he went to the next level,” Vazquez adds.
“Pep was really, really good at controlling the narrative. He knew the importance of taking all the responsibility for what was being said off the pitch. He was a leader in the press room. That allowed Messi to be the leader on the pitch.”
“Tito Vilanova and Luis Enrique (who both would later manage Messi at Barcelona) were the same. When Messi has been well managed and only had to be worried about delivering on the pitch, things were great for him and the club.”
At the time Messi’s 38-goal tally of 2008-09 seemed incredible for a player who wasn’t even a striker. What’s even more incredible, though, is that he would end up scoring even more goals in each of the next 10 seasons.
Messi had evolved into a relentless football machine, and one that was defining an era. He wasn’t just an unstoppable football talent, he was a fierce competitor who barely allowed his manager to let him rest for a day.
By 2010 he’d won a second Champions League and his second Ballon d’Or, but behind the scenes at Barcelona, things were starting to change. That summer, Sandro Rosell was elected club president, ousting Guardiola’s long-time ally Joan Laporta. The vibe around the club was starting to change.
Barcelona, the distinguished club with a unique style on the pitch but also a unique set of standards off it, ended their iconic shirt sponsorship deal with Unicef and replaced the children’s charity with the Qatar Foundation, igniting a huge moral debate.
There was also a public spat between Rosell and club legend Johan Cruyff — the iconic Dutchman gave up his Barcelona medal of honour just after Rosell was elected president. Cruyff was known to be a close to Laporta, who usually sought the advice of the former Barcelona player and manager much as Guardiola had done. Rosell was not impressed by the influence Cruyff had on the club.
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A year later, Guardiola decided to not extend his contract and left. Suddenly a club that had felt serene was engulfed with the kind of infighting and politics that can be found at any other major club.
With Guardiola gone, so began an era of instability in the dugout. Barcelona appointed new managers in three consecutive summers (Vilanova in 2012, Gerardo Martino in 2013 and Luis Enrique in 2014). At times it felt as though the only constant, and the only thing that could quell the turmoil, was the brilliance of Messi — and the club’s fans will never forget it. With the club slowly losing its direction as the decade wore on, it increasingly fell to Messi to steer the ship — and he revelled in the role, and the power it gave him.
There’s arguably no better quote to illustrate Messi’s standing at the club by this stage than from Martino during his season in charge of Barcelona.
“I know that if you call the president and ask for my head, he would fire me the next day,” a worried Martino said to Messi. “But, please, I don’t need you to prove it to me every day.”
Those words were revealed in 2020 by former Barca sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta during an interview with El Pais. And it wasn’t the last time Messi would throw his weight around, as Zubizarreta himself could attest.
The former goalkeeper paid the price when, during his first season as manager, Luis Enrique got into a heated training ground debate with Messi.
“After a foul on Messi during a practice game that the manager didn’t (penalise), Messi lost his mind and went against Luis Enrique. The manager didn’t back off and they had a few words for each other,” the former Barcelona defender Jeremy Mathieu revealed some years later.
It was the first week of 2015. The players had just returned to training after the Christmas break, with Messi and Neymar having permission from the club to come back a few days later than the rest, missing two training sessions.
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Then, in the first game of the year against Real Sociedad, Luis Enrique decided to bench Messi and Neymar. Barcelona lost 1-0.
The result cranked up the tension, with the club already suffering from disharmony in the dressing room, summer signings failing to match expectations and the team struggling to keep up with Real Madrid at the top of the table. And things got worse the following day.
Barcelona hosted an open training session for fans, but Messi was nowhere to be seen. As club captain, it fell to Xavi to arrange peace talks between Messi and his manager.
In a panic, club president Josep Maria Bartomeu made Zubizarreta a scapegoat, sacking him “due to all the noise around the team”, then announced elections to decide a new president at the end of the season.
Barcelona ended the season winning the treble with Luis Suarez, Neymar and Messi dovetailing to form one of the deadliest attacking trios football has ever witnessed, scoring 122 goals between them in that season alone.
It is hard to do justice to the impact Lionel Messi has had in Barcelona, both the city and the football club. The sheer magnetism of what he could do on the pitch drew hundreds of thousands of fans from across the globe to Camp Nou. The opposition were irrelevant – everyone just wanted to have their own eye witness account of Messi.
In Barcelona, Messi is more than a football hero, he is a pop culture icon. The city is dotted with murals showing him in the club’s colours. There are bars named after him, shops and restaurants decorated with photos of his most iconic moments. It is only a matter of time before one of the region’s major roads is renamed in his honour.
In 2021, according to government data, Leo was the fifth most-common name given to newborns in Catalonia, and the only name in the top six without a Catalan origin.
The latter stages of Messi’s time in Barcelona were marked by European failures and his increased detachment from the management of the club. As time went by, the board, led by Bartomeu, had lost any sense of control over the dressing room, spoiled with lucrative contracts but also let down by a poor transfer policy that rarely improved the squad.
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This brought about one of the saddest moments of Messi’s life — the infamous burofax.
Back in 2020, tired of the dysfunctional way the club was being managed, the Argentinian sent a legal document to the club expressing his wish to leave on a free transfer, possible because of a clause in his contract.
Messi had interest from Manchester City, with Guardiola keen on a reunion. Bartomeu, however, had no intention of being the president who lost Messi, and told his star player that the clause had in fact expired.
Messi reluctantly stayed at Barcelona against his will, with the fans furious that Bartomeu had allowed the relationship between club and player to turn so painfully sour. The re-election of Laporta in March 2021 seemed like the perfect chance for Messi to reconnect with the club. The returning president was known for creating a bond with players and controlling the dressing room, and things got off to a great start: Barcelona won the Copa del Rey the following month and soon Messi was expressing a determination to stay put.
Barcelona were set for a tough summer fighting against multiple financial constraints, but Laporta and his board reached an agreement in principle for Messi’s terms for a new contract. It included a progressively increasing salary, with Messi set to earn around €20million in the first season. This represented a significant pay cut in the short term.
But as soon as Messi and his family returned to Barcelona after that summer’s Copa America, they realised things weren’t going as expected. Club executives were starting to get nervous, asking for last-minute meetings, and the club eventually pulled out of the deal when they realised they simply could not afford it.
Messi’s tears in his farewell press conference were particularly scarring for a fanbase that had become accustomed not only to the good times, but also to Messi being there to bail their team out when it looked like bad times were ahead. Suddenly, their saviour had gone.
Barcelona’s attempt at arranging a dream reunion this summer after two tormented years apart felt doomed from the start given the financial strain the club is still under. But there was still a glimmer of hope.
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“Yes, of course I’d like to be around the club someday,” Messi told Spanish outlets Mundo Deportivo and Sport in June. “I still don’t know when or how but I hope I can help in the future because this is a club I love. What is for sure is that we are going to live in Barcelona. That’s something that our family has decided, and will happen sooner than later.”
Imagine telling that angst-ridden 13-year-old listening to Argentine cumbia on his way to school that, after 21 years, Barcelona would be the place that most felt like home.
(Photos: Getty Images; design: Sam Richardson)
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