All the galácticos were on display but Barcelona confirmed, in one of the greatest of all football settings, that they truly were the team of the moment. All eyes were on Ronaldinho who scored two goals and then received an unexpected present: a standing ovation from the Bernabéu. Barcelona’s frontmen of Ronnie, Eto’o and Messi were unstoppable, and the Argentinian, from the right wing, won his personal battle with Roberto Carlos. No longer would they debate who was the better among the new faces, Leo or Robinho. The 0–3 win put an end to all the verbal battles. In the fifty-ninth minute Iniesta came on as substitute for him. Yes, Leo was ready for the big matches.
On 13 December, in the Camp Nou, he received the Golden Boy award given out by Tuttosport to the best Under 21 player. Wayne Rooney was well behind in second place. Ronnie went up to Leo after he received the trophy to tell him that one day, in the not too distant future, they would be giving him the Ballon d’Or, the very trophy that just a few days later the Brazilian himself would receive.
It had been a triumphant year.
*
Leo had played one game at number 10, behind the striker, with Frank Rijkaard. Three months after his debut against Porto, a Barcelona, full of substitutes and youngsters from the B team, organised a friendly behind closed doors against Bernd Schuster’s Shakhtar Donetsk. Leo replaced Luis García, and Ten Cate suggested letting him play a free role. Aged just 16, he obliged. But he went back to Barcelona’s second team and when, months later, he returned to the first team, he did so to play on the wing. It was designed to get him away from the maelstrom in the centre of the pitch, and they were also looking to make the most of his speed when faced by the full-backs, to make diagonal runs cutting inside, which drew defenders to him and created more space for others. But even Rijkaard knew that his time spent on the wing would only be temporary.
And that his position on the wing was not just a tactical move.
Leo’s transition into the Barcelona first team had gone through various stages of evolution: one was tactical and the other was to do with his role within the squad. The two go hand in hand. When Rijkaard began to allow him his passage into the elite, the starting eleven was full of stars. The nucleus was formed by Ronaldinho, Deco and Eto’o. Leo added his own quality to this group. Rijkaard was not prepared to change the established order, those invisible and yet so powerful and essential checks and balances that govern a team. One that was clearly lighting up the world. Messi played on the right wing and, like all youngsters who reach the top, he was prepared to obey orders, did as he was told with the same level of commitment he showed at all levels of La Masía. Without being a typical winger, and despite being left-footed, he immediately showed his value. And the weakest link was sacrificed – Ludovic Giuly.
Leo was growing into his small role on the confines of the wings, but very soon he began to look for more space, to attempt moves more suited to his understanding of the game, away from the flanks. The second stage of his tactical evolution was beginning to take shape.
Good coaches know that if a player keeps on knocking at the door, demanding more space, you’re going to have to open it and let him in. But in that eco-system that is a group of footballers, if a new boy wants to invade others’ territory, he might well find that those who might be affected are not about to let him demonstrate his superiority, or the coach might decide to clip his wings, because he doesn’t want to destabilise the overall collective.
Rijkaard had promised Messi that he would eventually let him play in the centre, but in the first years with the first team he was not given that opportunity. In fact, he had to wait for the arrival of Pep Guardiola before that second tactical evolution took place properly.
The game most representative of the Rijkaard era involving Leo Messi in a starting role but on the flank was the Chelsea−Barcelona Champions League fixture played in February and March 2006.
The year before, Chelsea had eliminated Barcelona at the start of hostilities between the two clubs who ended up facing each other three times in three consecutive seasons. On that occasion, the blaugranas had won the first leg 2-1 but Chelsea manager José Mourinho accused Frank Rijkaard of speaking to the referee, Anders Frisk, at the interval. The death threats that followed Frisk sending off Didier Drogba compelled Frisk to terminate his refereeing career. Mourinho was suspended for two games. In the return leg at Stamford Bridge, Chelsea beat the Catalans 4–2, after a spectacular start that saw the Londoners go into a 3–0 lead. Terry’s goal in the last seconds of the game, despite a foul on Víctor Valdés by Ricardo Carvalho that was not acknowledged by the referee, decided the game. ‘Barcelona is a great club, but it’s only won one Champions League once in a hundred years,’ said Mourinho, raising the stakes for any future encounters. ‘I’ve only spent a few years coaching, and I’ve already won it.’
On 22 February 2006, in the first leg of the last 16, there was talk of revenge in the match between possibly the two best teams in Europe at the time, both of whom had two distinct ways of playing and two very different types of coaches. ‘There was a tense atmosphere. Everybody felt it,’ remembers Asier del Horno, the Chelsea left-back at that time. The Portuguese manager, as usual, laid down the conditions as to how the game should be played: the sprinklers left the pitch like a mudbath, the ball hardly rolled at all and the teams seemed prepared to cancel each other out. Perhaps for that reason Iniesta was left on the bench and the Barcelona midfield contained a lot of muscle: Deco, Edmilson and Motta. The three forwards were as expected. Ronaldinho on the left but with licence to move around, Eto’o would be the striker and Leo Messi on the right wing.
That game was the perfect, graphic example of the Argentinian’s game under Rijkaard. From the very first minute he showed himself to be on the offensive, looking for the one vs ones, very wide. And the team were looking for him even though, with him being only just 18, others should have taken more responsibility. Messi, wearing the number 31 on his back, responded with the first shot at goal, creating the first moment of danger for Chelsea, and pressing whenever he lost possession, as he converted himself into public enemy number one for the Chelsea defence.
Del Horno knew from the very beginning that he was facing a fast running and bold opponent.
‘Tactically we were well-organised,’ explains del Horno. ‘Mourinho had prepared the match in detail, with the intention of blocking the movement of Barcelona. In midfield there were people like Makelele, Lampard and Essien who covered the defence, but Messi still got through. He faced up to me two or three times and I tried to stop him with my experience and whatever resources I had.’
On one occasion, Leo got past him and the following time del Horno stopped him with a brutal knee-high tackle that left his stud marks on the Argentinian’s right leg. The referee did not caution the defender.
‘He didn’t retaliate. He said nothing. There is retaliation in football between defenders and forwards but not in this case,’ confirms del Horno.
And then came the event that the whole world remembers. The one that marked the whole encounter.
Thirty-sixth minute.
Leo received the ball on the right-hand side around halfway. A heavy touch made Robben think that the ball would go over the line. But Messi had other ideas.
‘The Flea’ set off at speed to fight for the ball about three metres from the corner flag. Where wingers live and die. Robben was protecting it while Leo tried to get through on Robben’s right, then on his left. The Dutch winger attempted a badly miscalculated shoulder charge and lost his balance and Leo took advantage to outrun him on the left.
Leo regained the ball in the quarter circle of the corner.
Robben dived in with two feet, but a smooth touch from the Argentinian turned the manoeuvre into a nutmeg. With the Chelsea player on the floor, Leo hurried after the ball when …
‘I saw the defender coming towards me, aggressively, with bad intentions…’ (Leo)
‘I tried to stop him …’ (del Horno)
/> ‘…and I jumped …’ (Leo)
‘… and he went past me …’ (del Horno)
‘… and that’s why he didn’t get me …’ (Leo)
‘He started to roll around the ground and I was sent off’ (del Horno).
A melee ensued and with Puyol and Robben unable to understand what the other was saying, plus the tension, they almost came to blows. After a few seconds the referee, Terje Hauge, showed a red card to the Chelsea full-back.
‘Messi was clever, he was intelligent, it looked like it had been a terrible tackle but in reality it was nothing … Lionel exaggerated, without doubt.’
‘The saddest thing about the game is that they said that it wasn’t a foul,’ says Silvinho. ‘It’s quite clear, del Horno had lost the plot and was going for Leo at full pelt. It was a red card.’
‘It was lunacy’ is how Henk ten Cate described it.
‘But Leo behaved impeccably,’ remembers Silvinho. ‘If it’s a foul, it’s a foul, if it’s red, it’s red and that’s it.’
‘I didn’t say anything to the defender. Him to me neither. It was all part of the game, that is football. He tried to do the best for his team,’ Messi explains now. ‘It was that incident where it all took off but after that the match continued normally.’
Yes. The game continued.
Leo didn’t hide after the incident, despite being booed by the Stamford Bridge crowd every time he touched the ball. He hadn’t said a word during that clash, or throughout the game. The atmosphere, electric after half an hour’s play, was feeding him. He wanted the ball. He went in search of his new rival, Paulo Ferreira, who had moved over onto the left of the defence, with Geremi, who had replaced Joe Cole, on the other side.
The sending-off had given Mourinho the necessary excuse to defend deep in search of a goalless draw. Messi wanted to change the plan but his team was not with him.
Lampard hit a free-kick, Valdés made a mistake in coming out and the ball hit Motta. Own goal. The game was turning Chelsea’s way.
Leo carried on demanding the ball. He was the most dominant of all the forwards, continuing to look for the weaknesses in the opposition so as to turn the tie around, giving depth and bravery to the team. The referee ignored a penalty for a foul on ‘the Flea’.
Twenty minutes from the end, a free kick from Ronaldinho was deflected off the head of John Terry, under pressure from Rafa Márquez, into his own goal. The sides were level at 1–1.
And eight minutes later, the Mexican central defender took the ball from his own half before putting in a cross to the far post that was met by the head of Eto’o to secure a 1–2 win. José Mourinho’s first defeat at home in 49 matches.
‘We got our revenge for the previous year,’ says a smiling Ten Cate as he recalls the game.
Leo had had five shots on goal, one of which struck the crossbar. He was involved in the sending-off and added intensity to the play of the brilliant but inconsistent Ronaldinho.
No, it wasn’t a game for Messi. In theory. But the Argentinian showed up at the Bridge before Barcelona did. He was born a star in that most decisive of scenarios. ‘The best appearance in world football for many a year,’ wrote Santiago Segurola in El País. The crowning moment in a game for grown-ups.
His performance made such an impact that Ronaldinho and Eto’o, voted FIFA’s first and third best players of the year respectively, were treated as secondary actors He had climbed not one but two steps up the hierarchical ladder. After his display against Udinese, and the excellent game at the Bernabéu, his performance at Stamford Bridge was to have a universal impact. And not surprisingly at home as well: no one was going to take his starting place now. Giuly began to appear only occasionally in the team after that match.
José Mourinho started to play the second leg at the press conference. ‘It’s easier for you to see it than me,’ he responded to the journalists when they asked him about del Horno’s sending-off, ‘because you have monitors. I think it’s better if you say what happened, because I don’t want to find myself in a difficult situation. The result is 1–2. What can we do? Are we going to suspend Messi for being theatrical? Yes, he was theatrical. Catalonia is a place of culture and they [referring to the Catalan media] know what theatre is. Theatre is good.’
The Camp Nou would receive Mourinho two weeks later with a bit of cultural advice: ‘Go to the theatre, Mourinho, go to the theatre.’
In the return leg, Leo began the match stuck on the left-hand touchline, but just a few minutes into the game he began to make his way from the left into a more central position; he could stand the heat and he wanted to get into the kitchen, where the goals were created.
Then, suddenly, with 25 minutes played, he collapsed on the pitch.
He was injured. A pulled muscle.
He beat the ground in frustration. His fragile body was going to keep him out of the game again.
Rijkaard went over to Leo on his way to the dressing room. And he gave him a hug. Leo’s right hand went around the waist of his coach and he buried his head in the Dutchman’s coat. He wanted that embrace. Needed it.
Barcelona drew 1–1. But qualification for the quarter-finals [where they would meet Benfica] had come at a cost: Messi’s progress had been stalled once again.
Messi had felt a sharp pain when he collided with William Gallas, but he carried on, hoping it was nothing. There was no contact with any other player at the moment he fell to the ground, just the realisation that he was injured and it wasn’t just a spasm. When in 2010 Goal.com asked Leo Messi to identify the two key moments in his career, what came to mind was that night in the Camp Nou: ‘My first major injury.’
A torn muscle at the top of the femoral bicep in the right leg, the muscle that sprinters depend on to give them an explosive start and one with which Messi will become very familiar. A four-centimetre tear, said Barcelona. Five, said the press. It was the second injury in the same muscle that he had suffered in a month. The first one had kept him out of action for twelve days, following a return to fitness which, with hindsight, had been a little too accelerated. This time he would be out for between four and six weeks. A month and a half later he was still not ready. Leo, who had played 25 games that season, finally spent 79 days away from the training ground.
They say in football that muscular injuries do not occur by chance, that they are all avoidable. If a muscle gives way it is because something has gone wrong in the warm-up; or it’s down to a player’s lifestyle, or the lack of attention he pays to his body. Perhaps Messi, despite being rested the previous Sunday for the game against Depor, arrived with accumulated muscular fatigue. Perhaps he had not recovered sufficiently from the previous muscle injury. Some say he had not warmed up properly. The clash with Gallas might have affected it.
But the fact is there are no definitive scientific tests that can explain muscular injuries. Only suspicions and fears, and the need for some precautionary measures. The club has to take some of the blame because at that time they didn’t monitor the condition of the players as exhaustively as they do nowadays: they had accumulated twenty similar muscular injuries in three seasons with twelve different players affected.
When he was appealing for calm over Leo, Frank Rijkaard had all this in mind.
Certainly Messi did not know his body’s limitations then as well as he does today. It didn’t bother him if he finished a game with his ankles and legs scarred, with his feet covered in bruises or with cuts, blisters and grazes. It was the life he had chosen, all part of the game. But two injuries in a month suggested that something else was going on. It didn’t sound alarm bells but Leo did begin to ask where all this was coming from.
The answer wasn’t simple, but Messi did not have to look very far to discover it. When he arrived in the first team, still an adolescent, in his life off the field he began to relax.
It wasn’t a case of too much partying, rather one of order. Or lack of it. In his eating, in his personal timetable.
Also, Le
o climbed the ladder of success too quickly; everything had got faster and this distracted him. Maybe he was mentally prepared to move forward more quickly than the majority of players of his age, but sudden changes in physical demands, and the new strains imposed by playing in an elite team, were difficult to assimilate. Every few months at a new level brought new challenges; the game became faster as he progressed, the battles harder, the tempo higher; there was more public attention, a greater need to win, an increasing response to greater expectations. And the first team was a place where to survive as a professional it was essential to take special care of yourself, to keep regular hours, to eat healthily. Vital requirements if he really wanted to shine.
Sometimes you have to make mistakes to find out what your limitations are.
Sometimes Leo would eat at La Masía with Barcelona B and then later on again in one of the Argentinian restaurants. The usual menu there would consist of a couple of empanadas (pies), always meat. And then a Scaloppe Milanese. He was so fond of the 200 grams of meat dipped in egg and breadcrumbs with tomato sauce, with ham and cheese, cooked in the oven, always with chips and always without salad, that in the restaurants he frequented it was known as ‘la Milamessi’. And, to finish, ice cream made with sweetened milk and chocolate. Occasionally he would vary the empanadas and Milanese with a plate of meat ravioli. Always washed down with water or Coca-Cola. He did not touch alcohol.
Messi Page 34