And that’s how the Messis, determinedly, rationally and with a great deal of spiritual strength, decided to set out on a great adventure.
Scene Five
The beginning of the twenty-first century saw the start of a period of exile for Argentinian footballers whereby they crossed the Atlantic in search of their dreams. The crisis accentuated the process that saw football schools throughout the country become breeding grounds of talent. Footballers were being converted into assets and in many cases the principal income of clubs, institutions that often worked hand in hand with exploitative directors and bosses. And so the footballing exile from the country became the norm and continued to grow throughout the first decade of the century. Between 2009 and 2010, Argentina exported almost 2,000 footballers, more than Brazil, historically the number-one seller of footballers.
We are in a high-ceilinged café. People are sitting around a table drinking coffee. In the corner there is a television set circa 2000 featuring the same animated family conversation we saw earlier, but without sound. On one side is a large glass window. Outside it is raining.
Dr Schwarzstein (endocrinologist): Throughout this period Argentina became an expulsive country. In fact between 2000 to 2003 the number of Argentinians arriving in Spain to work soared dramatically.
Liliana Grabín (sports psychologist): We were really ‘thrown out’ of the country. Even my daughter left, went to the USA. It was a total debacle.
Sergio Levinsky (sociologist): Jorge Messi worked for Acindar, a state-owned company. And as the country was in such a state, workers worried about their future. Considering all that and seeing that Leo had talent to make it as a footballer, I think his dad put a lot of faith in him.
Liliana Grabín: What the Messis did represented a huge challenge. They challenged what was on offer to them, the road most people took. Instead, they said: ‘I can build somewhere else with new and better hope for the future.’ The number of people who said: ‘I won’t move from here, I am scared, staying is safer’ … Many people left, however, and with their vision of the future, with their abilities and talent, they managed to succeed. Not everybody can do that.
Sergio Levinsky: There were three levels of ‘expulsion’ of Argentinians in the last few years. Firstly, the Night of the Long Truncheons (1966), where mostly scientists left the country, also referred to as the ‘Milstein’, a name derived from that of César Milstein, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1984. He lived in London and when the government offered to allow him to return it was too late for him. The second generation of exiles, mostly political, took place during the military dictatorship in 1976. The journalist Ernesto Ekaizer, for instance. And the third one, the one we are talking about, of 2000−2001, the economic migration, included the Messis.
Liliana Grabín: Argentina expels people about every 10 to 15 years. The land to which our grandparents came to try to make their fortunes is today, definitively, a land of expulsion with two or three generations having gone through bad governments that have made many want to return to Europe.
Federico Vairo (supervisor at the River Plate trial): I used to go looking for young players and there are many in Rosario. A friend took me to see Messi. I thought he was very small. His father told me that he would like me to see him; he was nearly 12 and I had a trial for 16-year-olds. I told him that, but his father said his son was used to playing with older boys.
Eduardo Abrahamian (former director of River, now deceased): It was 2000. Messi was 12 years old and his parents brought him to River along with another boy called Giménez, with whom he doubled up in attack at Newell’s. The first day I saw him I was amazed, and I called Delem, who is the technical director of the juniors to come and see him, too.
Leandro Giménez (ex-player): We came to the trial together. We travelled in a car with Federico Vairo, and our parents separately in Jorge’s (Messi’s father’s) car. We were very tense. We were having a trial with River! I was so nervous that I even left my boots at home. Fortunately my old man was coming a bit later so he brought them for me. We were shocked from the outset when we heard how the fitness coach was shouting at the River players. ‘These idiots are coming to take your places, so make sure you kill them.’
On the television screen the Informe Robinson programme about Messi is being shown. Someone shouts, ‘look, it’s Jorge Messi’. The rest turn to the screen and listen to Jorge.
Jorge Messi (on Informe Robinson): He put himself in a line of footballers who were there for the trial and the coaches looked at him, and, seeing how small he was, they said to him, go over there. At the back. The boys started to come on for their trial and he was the last one and they would not call him. I was by the wire fence and I said to him, ‘make sure they put you on, because the trial is about to finish’. But absolutely nothing happened until the person in charge of the trial turned around, looked at him and said, ‘where do you play?’ And he said, ‘behind the striker’ (enganche). And he answered, ‘okay, on you go, play’. Just like that, without making a big deal of it. Two minutes went by, three, until he received the ball and when he got the ball he did two or three things that for us were normal, things he always did.
Leandro Giménez: When he came on in his first move he nutmegged this central defender who was about two metres tall. And in his second he did it again.
Jorge Messi: And the person in charge looked at him like this [surprised face], and said, ‘who’s his father?’ So I turned around and said ‘I am’. He said, ‘we want him, eh!’ He’d touched the ball twice! Just because he did a couple of dribbles and then smacked it at goal and forced the keeper into making a save. They asked me if I could bring him to River and I said, ‘No … the truth is that he is at Newell’s, but if you take charge of things and speak to Newell’s about bringing him here and sort out the move, no problem.’ He said. ‘No, because they are going to ask us for money, and this, and that.’ Anyway, it all eventually came to a sudden halt.
Leandro Giménez: Abrahamian asked us to return on Tuesday. That day he put us both on. We played against a group of boys who were also there for trials …
Federico Vairo: After ten minutes I called him over. Leo thought I was going to tell him off because he was going around everyone, but I said to him: ‘Don’t give the ball to anyone, and if you see me in your way, go around me as well.’
Leandro Giménez: We won about 15–0. Leo scored about ten goals. Abrahamian announced that they wanted to sign us.
Federico Vairo: The way he played, little Messi guaranteed himself a chance of becoming a River Plate player. But the youth foot-ball department thought he was very small. Also, we had to find accommodation for him, something we didn’t do for the juniors.
Leandro Giménez: Before we went back to Rosario, before we knew if we were going to become River players or not, Messi was worried: he was 12 and only guys of 13 onwards were allowed at River’s accommodation. ‘Could I stay with you?’ he asked me. We had already decided that if I came to Buenos Aires to be a River footballer I would live with my grandparents. But he had no one in the capital. I told him that he could come and live with me. Once in the car, though, we argued: Vairo was in the front with his assistant, and in the back Messi, another boy from Rosario and me. I don’t know the name of that other guy and I’ve never seen him since. Neither Leo nor I wanted to sit in the middle but he managed to sit by the window. I was really cross. I said to him, ‘Fine, sit by the window, but find your own house in Buenos Aires.’ So Leo looked at the other boy, and even though he didn’t know him, he asked him, ‘I’ll stay with you in Buenos Aires then?’ Days later, I changed my mind about what I’d said, but Messi never showed up. I found out through my father, who had spoken to Jorge, that Leo would not be coming to River. They wouldn’t say why.
Federico Vairo: I persisted [with the youth football department] and they told me that River tried so many youngsters that if we lost this one it wouldn’t be a big deal. I told them that he was different, a mixture
of Sivori and Maradona, but they took no notice. I think the situation arose because a group of ex-River players had interests at the Renato Cesarini club, and they took on a lot of their players, not so much those from Newell’s. I think that is why Messi didn’t stay.
Jorge Messi took Leo to the trial to put pressure on Newell’s who had promised to take care of the cost of his treatment. He had to go and pick the money up dozens of times, and of the 900 pesos that he needed, they gave him 400. It was humiliating. So he decided to go to Buenos Aires, to see what would happen, to see what Newell’s would say. It is not true, as it has been reported, that ‘Pipita’ Higuaín was involved with those trials that took place on the outer pitches of the Monumental.
So when the directors of Newell’s found out that they had travelled to the capital, the director, Almirón, in charge at the time of ‘Baby’ football at the Malvinas, went to the Messis’ house along with a coach. They came to ask Jorge not to take him away from Newell’s, that they would handle the cost of his treatment, and that this time they meant it. So the Messis returned to the Malvinas, once again in search, night after night, of what they had been promised. Sometimes they couldn’t get hold of Almirón, at other times he did not have the money on him. Why do we have to put up with this? the Messi family wondered.
Scene Six
Only a small table and a telephone are visible. From the left side of the stage the father of the family we have been seeing, first on set, then on the television, appears again. He looks as if he’s been hit by a bombshell: he has finally realised he cannot escape his family’s predicament. His son, the footballer, the talented one, cannot carry on playing in his own country.
He has spent weeks talking with his wife, Celia, and with his sons, but no decision has yet been reached. The dream of leaving has a dual purpose, to help Leo and to improve their lives, now that the country’s economic crisis has drastically reduced their income. He has been dreading the final decision, meal after meal, discussion after discussion. But it is becoming inevitable: all roads are taking the Messis away from home. If someone was prepared to bear the cost of Leo’s treatment, if someone would look after him, treat him with kindness, then this would be the club for which he would play his next games, spend his next years. There is talk of Italy (but he never had a trial with Como, as one particularly imaginative director of the Italian club has claimed). ‘Should we go to Italy?’ The possibility was discussed.
After the trial with River, some intermediaries connected to the prestigious Catalan agent Josep María Minguella, very close to Barcelona, got in touch with the father.
Jorge looks at their business card.
And picks up the phone.
3
Goodbye, Leo
‘Who’s that?’ asked Charly Rexach when he arrived after a leisurely post-prandial stroll to the benches where the various Barcelona academy trainers were following the game. It was a rhetorical question. The youngster with the ball stuck to his feet, with superior speed and dribbling prowess had to be the Argentinian who was being tried out against taller and older boys. Migueli and Rifé answered Charly in unison without taking their eyes off the pitch: ‘Messi.’
–
Fuckin’ hell, we’ve got to sign him – now!
Charly wanted to sign him immediately: ‘He’s been here for fifteen days, and that’s fourteen more than necessary. If a Martian had passed by and watched him, he’d have seen that he was something special.’ It was 2 October 2000.
Jorge and Leo returned to Argentina the following day. ‘Don’t worry, we’ll sort everything out and you can come back when the season begins. Or before,’ Charly promised.
But Leo was a foreigner so was ineligible for national competitions.
And as small as a table football player.
And just 13 years old.
And Barcelona had to find his father work in accordance with FIFA regulations.
And at that time the first team, which was not doing well, was the main priority of an unstable institution.
And they had to give him a better contract than juniors would normally get.
And ‘when and if he’s a superstar, we won’t be here,’ said one director.
And…hardly anyone was prepared to take the chance. That was it.
‘Do you really think he’s worth the aggravation, Charly?’
That was the question asked by club president, Joan Gaspart.
Meanwhile, weeks later, in Rosario they were still waiting for an answer.
Waiting for it was the young man who was once again playing for Newell’s junior side.
Waiting for it, too, was his father, unsure about his work situation.
Waiting for it was a family, unsure about whether to pack their bags and quit the country, their friends, their school, their lives. Or not.
A month went by.
And with the decision made that this youngster’s precocious talent should be allowed to flourish in the perfect setting, wherever that might be, hours turned into days and days into weeks as everyone marked time …and waited.
Another month went by. It was now December.
They were taking the piss. Didn’t they like him? Hadn’t they made a promise? Things like emails and faxes were not used as often as they are today. The telephone seldom rang.
And so it was that Barcelona received an ultimatum: either something was signed right now, or the boy would seek his future elsewhere. In Italy. There was an attractive offer on the table from AC Milan. At Atlético de Madrid. Or at Real Madrid, where, just months earlier, the club had launched a rasping and painful attack on the Barcelona soul with the capture of the Catalans’ captain, Luis Figo. It had left a festering wound. The Real sporting director, Jorge Valdano, was keeping an eye on the matter.
Rexach insisted to everyone that it was worth signing him, and everything else would be dealt with as it happened. Charly looked for the answers to convince the doubters. ‘We are taking the matter seriously, tell Jorge,’ was the message Rexach sent to the Messis. But it wasn’t enough.
‘Fancy a game of doubles, Charly?’ The offer came from Josep María Minguella, the Catalan agent famous for bringing Maradona to Barcelona, close to the board, a club member, and the man that had borne the cost of the Messis’ trip when they came for the trial. The two of them often met at the Pompeya tennis club run by the agent himself, and, as sometimes happened, Horacio Gaggioli, from Minguella’s office, the Messis’ guide during their visit to the city, also put his name down.
It was 14 December, ten weeks after Leo and Jorge’s visit to Barcelona.
After the game they had a beer. And as afternoon turned to early evening, and as the men gazed over the club’s courts, it was Minguella who raised the subject. ‘Charly, we ought to call the family; we keep telling them yes, that everything’s all right, but we still haven’t got anything concrete, we ought to sign a contract or something.’
Horacio insisted, ‘Charly, we’ve come this far. You are the technical director of the club, you need to commit to the signing of Leo today. And if not, leave it, that’s fine, you go your way and we go ours, that’s it.’
The Messis did not want a repeat of what had happened to them with River, promises not worth the paper they were written on. They had reached the point of no return. Barcelona was on the point of losing Leo.
And an impatient Charly, who understands little of protocol, said: ‘Let’s see, pass me a piece of paper.’
–
Waiter, a pen and paper.
The waiter had a ballpoint pen but no paper. The club’s offices were closed.
–
Here then.
He pulled a paper napkin from one of those small metal containers they put on bar tables.
–
So you can see that we are serious about this, said Rexach.
‘In Barcelona on 14 December 2000 in the presence of Messrs Minguella and Horacio [Gaggioli] Carles Rexach, technical director of FCB, commits to the s
igning, regardless of some opinions to the contrary, of Lionel Messi, as long as the figures previously agreed are respected.’
That was it. That’s what Minguella thought. So did Horacio, who had the napkin formally authorised by a notary before locking it away in a safe. And so did Rexach, who is one of those people who make quick decisions. In football and in life. It was about a gentleman’s agreement made between friends. As in the old days, when a handshake was gospel.
For some, it is the most important document in the recent history of Barcelona FC.
For others, Rexach, for example, it is a piece of paper with no real importance but one signed to placate Jorge and Leo, one that a few years later would become the subject of the most oft-repeated anecdote in the story of the Argentinian’s signing. Rexach would, to the whole world, from then on become known as the man who signed Messi.
The Messis have never seen that piece of paper.
But just what were Barcelona doing reaching agreements signed on a paper napkin?
‘When a player does well, everybody has something to say: I said that, I predicted that, it was down to me … And when it goes wrong, no one takes responsibility for anything.’ So says Charly Rexach, one of the most familiar figures at a club he joined as a 12-year-old and with whom he has had a contractual arrangement for more than four decades, as a player, assistant to Johan Cruyff, coach or right-hand man to various presidents. Charly cannot find any report on Leo written by himself, not that he is bothered. ‘I didn’t do one, I simply told them how good he was.’
Messi Page 13