Five goals in two matches, overtaking Miroslav Klose and setting a new record in World Cup history. Messi keeps adding new chapters to a story that seemed to have no more room for surprises.
Yet, to truly understand the superstar who now leads Argentina in search of another World Cup triumph, you have to go back more than 25 years, when Leo was still Lio, not yet the captain of the national team, with no Ballon d'Ors to show off and no trophies in his cabinet.
He was just a 13-year-old boy from Rosario with a huge dream and an equally big obstacle.
In Barcelona, that little boy who would later become the greatest, arrived in 2000, accompanied by his family.
His story became legendary also because of that improvised contract signed on a restaurant napkin during the first meeting (a napkin that, in 2024, was auctioned for 890,000 euros). There was no time to lose. It was already clear he was special.
But behind that symbolic gesture was a much deeper decision: Barca wasn't just offering him the chance to play football, but also taking on the responsibility for the medical treatment he needed to complete his development. To become the player he dreamed of being, Messi had to stay there.
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His first coach
However, the choice wasn't easy. The family's adjustment to their new life in Catalonia was tough, so much so that at one point the family returned to Argentina. Leo, on the other hand, decided to stay.
He remained with his father Jorge, a key figure in his personal and sporting growth. A decision that would change his story and football history forever.
At La Masia, the one who welcomed that reserved boy far from home was Xavi Llorens, the first Blaugrana coach of the child who, as a man, would become one of the greatest footballers in history. For some, the greatest of all.
“The first thing that struck me about Leo was the focus with which he played and trained: on every ball, at every moment, he was always extremely focused and attentive to everything,” recalls the current coach of the Catalan women's national team.
A quality that, looking back now, seems almost the first clue of what he would become.
Llorens, a talent scout
But even those who coached him up close couldn't have imagined such a trajectory.
“Honestly, I never thought he would achieve everything he has. Eight Ballon d'Ors, almost a thousand goals, all those titles,” Llorens admits with total honesty, someone who knows talent well, considering that as coach of the Barca women's team he brought Alexia Putellas back home and gave Aitana Bonmati her first-team debut.
But that boy already had some traits that would stay with him throughout his career. Off the pitch, he was very different from the player who would go on to amaze the world.
He was shy, introverted, with a very small circle around him: “Off the field, he was a very shy boy with very few friends. He had a special bond with Diong Mendy, but his circle of friends was quite limited,” Llorens recalls.
Leo, Diong and dad Jorge
Mendy was another young talent who had come from afar (Senegal), with whom Messi built a special relationship. Two foreign boys who, in the loneliness of a new environment, became each other's point of reference. Not just off the pitch, but especially on it: Leo created, Diong scored.
However, at a certain point, their parallel stories took different paths. Mendy, despite being the top scorer of that team and Messi's strike partner, had to face a tougher fate: at 17 he lost his father and was forced to focus more on his family, sacrificing part of the journey that could have taken him further.
Messi, on the other hand, always had his father Jorge by his side, a decisive figure who allowed him to focus on football and continue the path he started at La Masia:
"Arriving in Barcelona wasn't easy. His family struggled to adapt to the new life and there were doubts about whether to stay in the city. At one point, in fact, they decided to return to Rosario. But Leo wanted to stay and remained with his father," confirms Llorens.
The nonconformist
Talent alone, however, would not have been enough and, according to the Catalan coach, what made the difference was his refusal to ever settle:
“One of his key qualities is being a nonconformist. He wants to be perfect in everything he does. He always demands 200% from himself.”
A mentality that has stayed with him to this day, turning the Masia wonderkid into the player who has won eight Ballon d'Ors, a World Cup, and practically every trophy imaginable.
Faced with such an unrepeatable career, even his first coach can't hide a sense of wonder: “The expectations were high, but not to reach where he has. Not even in his wildest dreams could he have imagined something like this.”
The one true heir to Diego
And yes, because Messi has reached such heights that he is the only player who doesn't pale in comparison to Diego Armando Maradona. Two Argentinians, two different eras, two legends who passed through Barcelona.
“They are similar in so many ways," explains Llorens. "Maradona moved in more areas of the pitch and did everything perfectly even though he played in a much tougher football, with many more tackles.
"Messi, on the other hand, has a more defined position, often starting from the right to cut inside. But what they share is the ease with which they make the right decisions in the final third, the ability to make the difference when and where the match is decided.”
Today, Leo continues to amaze, continues to score, and continues to make an entire country dream - Argentina and its fans all over the world. Yet, in the eyes of those who knew him before he became Messi, there is still something of that boy who arrived in Barcelona more than twenty-five years ago.
"I still see him as a child. In my mind, he never grew up, even though many years have passed... And yet, even today, when I think of him, the first image that comes to mind is always that of a child."
But perhaps Llorens is right, and to understand everything that happened afterwards, you must never forget that shyness, that ability to stay focused on every ball, and that hunger to improve every day. That's where the explanation for an unrepeatable career lies: "We all have to be grateful to him."
