(Javier Mascherano)
If someone is aspiring to be the best, to reach the summit, it’s exactly at that moment that they begin to create the conditions that will make it a reality. The power of positive thinking is strange: we are capable through innate and internal processes to create optimistic scenarios that we can fervently believe in. Leo is positive, has a totally excessive belief in the effectiveness of his talent and has eliminated from his mind the slightest trace of doubt, that most dangerous of elements for any elite sportsman: doubt attracts the fear of defeat, paralyses and scatters itself around at the speed of light. That’s probably another reason why Leo cries when he loses: it’s pure frustration; it never enters his head that defeat is even a possibility.
This certainty in his ability helps him to look for the second dribble, the third. The second title, the third. The belief in his own abilities permits him to look relaxed, masterful, almost subconsciously, thereby preventing the fascinating (and, when it happens to you, deeply depressing) psychological block known as choking.
Perhaps the most famous example of this was the French golfer Jean van de Velde who suffered the yips at the British Open in 1999. By the time he got to the eighteenth tee it looked like the only decision he had left to make was whether to drink his victory champagne in the Jacuzzi or with his friends. Even with a double bogey, he was guaranteed the trophy, the highest level for a modest golfer. Van de Velde began to walk around the hole, touch the sand, look at the lake, spend too long looking at the grass, change his club, test for wind, try to control the noise of the crowd. He had lost his safety net; the pressure had got to him. He finished the hole on a triple bogey which meant he had to play off against Paul Lawrie. He lost. His descent into mediocrity continued long after the Open.
This mental block, suffered by sportsmen at the peak of their careers, often caused by external pressure, possibly a family problem, occurs when they suddenly become conscious of a skill that they have been nurturing and perfecting, subconsciously, for years. An elite sportsman computes his performance as he advances through his profession, which results, ultimately, in a matrix of millions of complex details, stored subconsciously in his brain. All goes well until the sportsman attempts to consciously unravel the matrix, becomes conscious of what he has been doing subconsciously for years. At this stage he experiences the fears that he had in childhood; that he might not succeed, that he might not run fast enough or hit the ball, or score the goal. He regresses.
There are no known blocks in Leo’s case, even though he has been known to miss the odd penalty at moments that mattered. That’s just bad luck. On the other hand, his self-confidence at the highest level of football and his repeated appearances at the great moments explain the leadership that he exercises over the club, the city, the country. He is followed by millions of ‘hopeful chasers of the dream’, as Pedro Gómez says. Or as the writer Juan Mateo and the coach Juanma Lillo put it in their book Liderar en tempos difíciles (‘Leading in Difficult Times’): ‘The true leader helps to magnify the members of his team. He doesn’t bring light into the darkness, but what he does do is find places that no one knew existed. He is a factory of ideas. In his head he unleashes an explosion of unedited images. Impulsive and inventive possibilities. He enthuses and is involuntarily converted into an antidote to idleness, that parasite that multiplies at every chance it gets.’
In other words, he inspires.
Leo has the world at his feet because we all want to be in that place that he inhabits – a peaceful environment and an example to all that, with effort, it is possible to achieve anything.
8. Emotional intelligence and its benefits (adaptation, control of emotions)
‘I visualise the games moments before I step out onto the pitch. I don’t think about any of this during the week. Beforehand I warm up in the dressing room. I don’t get nervous. Well, not often.’
‘I don’t think on the pitch. Well, I only think about getting the ball – to have it and be able to play. When I have it, I play.’
‘I don’t plan any of the dribbling I do. It just comes out. I work during the week only to keep fit and to follow what my coach asks me to do, but I don’t really care who my opponent is. I’m not bothered.’
‘The stadiums I like the most are the ones where they get at me and at my team. They motivate me. They make me want to give of my best. For example, when we’re playing Real Madrid, I prefer to play in Madrid. I like the rivalry.’
(Leo Messi at the Ballon d’Or gala, 2012)
In one of the first Ballon d’Or galas that Leo attended he was approached by one of the organisers and told that he should say something in English. ‘No, no, I don’t speak English. And they suggested, “well, just say ‘thank you’”.’ Leo was clear. ‘No. If I have to speak English, then I’m not going out.’ In the end he did come out, but he didn’t speak any English. If they take Leo off the football pitch he will do everything he can not to be messed about, so as not to feel out of his comfort zone. It’s nothing to do with shyness. It’s about self-protection, reserve. He needs to have everything under control.
Everything is football and the greatest fear is of burnout. His limited world (the club, his shirt, his boots, the ball) limits his association with the wider world. His Dolce & Gabbana polka-dot suit that he wore to the 2012 gala suggests that he is beginning to feel more comfortable away from the ball, but it won’t be in interviews or in front of an audience, other than in a football stadium, that we’ll be allowed to see the real Leo. Interviews are non-productive in attempting to plumb the depths of his personality. ‘It’s better that others should speak about me’ is his customary response.
When Leo leaves football he will retire, but he will carry on living in this world of the round-ball game. It’s the one he knows best, where he recognises himself. This obsession with the game means that a superficial analysis might suggest that off the field of play Messi is an uncomplicated soul. The different levels of intelligence that we have talked about confirm something completely different.
Leo has to co-exist with anxiety, nerves, mistrust, mood, security, motivation, distress, and his handling of them can increase or decrease his performance levels. Well managed, they bring with them wisdom; out of control, they ensure chaos. Emotional intelligence is an essential complement to making good decisions.
In the early Nineties, psychology professor Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi created his theory about what he called the ‘flow state’. ‘His proposal,’ Pedro Gómez explains, ‘concerns the existence of something at the highest level of performance called “flow”, in which certain individuals display a superior level of control over their emotions to the point where they can activate and apply that control to the job in hand. So effective is this ability to block out everything else and focus entirely on what they are doing that, effectively, time flies. Their actions are seen with great clarity, despite the rivals’ attempt to interrupt their concentration. The individual doesn’t decide, he anticipates. He doesn’t play, he enjoys. He is effectively working on automatic pilot. The player and the game become one, an inseparable reality. In other words, and so you understand it better … What Messi does game after game in a natural way!’
This doesn’t sound like an ‘uncomplicated soul’. Rafa Nadal has admitted that he has trained his mind since he was four years old. Leo’s mastery of what he does comes partly from that control he has exercised over his emotions from an early age.
Messi also comes from a culture that is aligned to another type of intelligence: craftiness. ‘For me, what I like most is his craftiness. He makes the difference because he is so cunning,’ says Alfredo Di Stéfano. Espanyol fans still remember that goal he scored with his hand the same season as the famous slalom goal against Getafe.
Leo, in another show of guile, learned how to defend himself against the kicks they would give him from the outset of a match. ‘When he takes the ball with his left, notice how as soon as they are about to come into him from th
e right he lifts his foot [so that the defender crashes into his studs],’ discovered José María Cuartetas, eponymous owner of one of Leo’s favourite restaurants in Barcelona. ‘Pelé used to do that a lot, and Maradona: it’s so that the first person to be hurt will be the other guy. And then the next time the defender thinks twice, or decides to go in much harder, which makes it easier for the referee to give a decision.’
9. Enjoyment
‘My intention is to come onto the pitch and enjoy myself as I did when I was a boy. I know that I have a responsibility and today I play to win to achieve things, but at the same time I enjoy myself, always.’
(Messi, in the Audemars Piguet commercial)
‘I don’t know what I would have been without football. If I could I’d like to play a game every day.’
(Leo Messi)
‘There’s a feeling that both Maradona and Messi transmit: the pleasure of playing. They are two people who have fun with the ball … And say, “let’s go and play”.’
(Frank Rijkaard)
‘It’s like that trick they do with the three coins. The hand is quicker than the eye. The charm of it is that he does with the feet what others do with their hands. The skill comes from time immemorial and is accompanied with a passion and a pleasure for what is football, which means that every time you see him with a ball it’s like watching a boy with a chocolate treat.’
(Fernando Signorini, physical coach of Club Deportivo Universidad de
San Martín de Porres (Lima) and ex-member of the technical staff of the
Argentinian national side)
‘When he cries it’s because he knows he won’t be able to play. When he hurts himself he thinks “Sunday I won’t be able to play”, he doesn’t think of anything else.’
(Juanjo Brau, Barcelona physiotherapist)
‘Leo loves football, because he was born to play football. We went somewhere and he asked for a ball. There wasn’t one, so he asked for something, anything round that he could have at his feet. Leo’s capable of controlling just about anything with his feet. If you were to pass him a slipper he’d do keepy-uppies with that.’
(Juan Cruz Leguizamón, ex-team-mate of Leo in the lower grades at
Newell’s Old Boys)
When he was a kid, Leo never did any special training. He just played for the pleasure of it. I have asked hundreds of footballers what they would do if they were walking in the park and the ball from a game that some youngsters were playing fell at their feet. Surprisingly the vast majority of them say they would not get involved in the kickabout. David Beckham would certainly start to play with the kids. Leo as well. They love the sport that has made them rich and famous. There are many (Batistuta has even stated it publicly) who don’t even like football.
Leo is conspicuously a football man. He knows just about everything about the game; you can ask him about players from wherever, statistics, histories, he remembers results, who scored, who won, with a retentive memory that is surprising. Not only, but predominantly Argentinian football. ‘He is joyful with football, or, rather, he treats football with some innocence,’ analyses Eduardo Sacheri. ‘You see him and what you are watching is a kid in the park, totally unaware of what is happening anywhere else. When something doesn’t work out he gets cross. When it comes out right, he’s happy. When they kick him his way of getting his own back is to snub whoever is kicking him. These are the football codes he follows.’
Like all elite footballers, although his adolescence was snatched away from him he kept the creative energy and outbursts of a kid, and from this also comes the essence of his art and the attraction of his leadership.
Hernán Casciari, an Argentinian writer resident in Barcelona, has a telling piece in Revista Orsai that sums up this essence of his character. ‘It all began this morning: I am looking non-stop at Messi goals on YouTube, rather guiltily because I’m in the middle of finishing magazine number six. By chance I click on a compilation of clips that I haven’t seen before. It’s a strange compilation: the video shows hundreds of images – of about two or three seconds each – in which Messi is fouled really badly but doesn’t fall. He neither throws himself to the ground, nor moans. In every frame he follows the ball with his eyes while he regains his balance. He makes superhuman efforts to try to ensure that what is done is not a foul, nor a yellow card for the opposing defender. Suddenly, I’m stunned, because I see something familiar in these images. I put each frame in slow motion and I notice that Messi’s eyes are always concentrated on the ball, but I don’t remember it in a footballing context. Where have I seen that look before? In whom? I paused the video. Zoomed in on his eyes. And then I remembered it: they were Totin’s eyes when he lost all sense of reason for anything except the sponge he was chasing. When I was young I had a dog called Totin. Nothing moved him. He wasn’t an intelligent dog. Burglars would come in and he’d watch them steal my television. The doorbell would ring and it seemed that he didn’t hear it.’ Messi, says Casciari, was effectively the same as his dog, he with the ball, Totin with the sponge. At that point there was nothing else and you could see it in the eyes of both of them. ‘This is my theory and I’m sorry if you’ve got this far expecting more. When football began it was like this. Before, football was played like Messi and Totin play. Everyone just went after the ball and nothing more.’ Messi, he adds, is effectively from that era and, to continue the canine analogy, like a dog with a bone. He continues: ‘He smashed records from other eras because up to the Fifties football was played by man-dogs. After that FIFA invited everyone to talk about laws and articles and we forgot that what was important was “the sponge”.’
‘Technique has its limits, and that is given by co-ordination,’ says Quique Domínguez. ‘Everything else can be taught, everything can be learned, but you need to go beyond the technical level to be a great: Leo gives you a handshake and talks to you, but you can see that, secretly, he is looking for the ball. You have to have that passion, you have to have that commitment.’
10. Genes
‘He can score goals, assists, destabilise defences on his own, run with the ball at a hundred miles an hour and change direction. This isn’t easy to do. You try it! Then come back and tell me how you got on.’
(Arsène Wenger, Arsenal manager)
‘Okay …Seriously now, someone’s got to test Messi’s genes … I’m beginning to firmly believe that Messi is the child of Clark Kent [Superman].’
(Bar Rafaeli, model)
‘His physical virtues are something completely natural, but it’s curious that they should all come out of him because out of all the brothers the only one with these characteristics is Leo.’
(Fernando Signorini)
There is no gene that makes a child a genius. No one is born a genius. There’s a lot of training and some innate properties that help you rise to the giddy heights. Perhaps, as some scientists suggest, the relevant genetic connection is the compulsion to achieve those goals.
‘Who are these people who leave their footprint on humanity, in football, science, the arts, culture?’ asks sports psychologist Liliana Grabín. ‘They are unique personalities, unrepeatable, they leave a legacy behind, there’s no doubt about it. They did not mean to lead anything and that’s why they leave a legacy. They are maestros. Science, historically, still doesn’t know where it all comes from.’
Leo Messi has a unique mixture of gestural speed (that’s to say, the speed of his movements) and skill. There are a few in the world with his characteristics. Marco Reus of Borussia Dortmund, for example, is fast with the ball at his feet and very skilful with the same gestural speed as Leo, but with a larger stride. But he is worse in the overall calculations, because he has difficulty in stringing together successive dribbles, while the Argentinian can put together three, four or more if he comes out from the last one with the ball under control. Messi’s legs move faster than any other footballer and this gives him an advantage: the rhythm in his stride, which is essentially natural, is also un
ique: 4.5 strides per second, better than the 4.4 strides of Asafa Powell, the Jamaican sprinter who broke the 100 metres world record in 2007. The skill to carry out the smoothest of touches, one after the other, assisted by this gestural speed, gives him another advantage. And the ability to turn at full speed (a mixture of co-ordination and speed) is another physical attribute that helps him shake off his opponents.
‘This is natural,’ says Fernando Signorini. ‘You won’t achieve this even if you invent 800,000 different co-ordination exercises because, as Panceri [Armando Panceri, Argentinian footballer] says, the unexpected doesn’t arrive as a result of specific planning.’
Leo arrived at Barcelona where they look for a profile of a footballer different from that of their rivals (Espanyol, Real Madrid): technical ability. Often those players (at 10, 11, 12 years old) are technically able but with a much better co-ordination than their tallest companions, and shine out because they are able to keep the ball and dribble better than the rest, proof of good coordination. The small boys therefore mature and evolve quicker and are more technically competent. Along the way ‘the Flea’ developed body strategies and rapid movements to compensate for his physical shortcomings, and to avoid an opponent bringing him down, to be able to nullify the advantage that a bigger boy, who was able to cover the same distance but in fewer strides, would have.
Or put another way, while gestural speed has its origins in genetics, it is improved and expanded with practice. In the street, in the football school.
With the passing of the years, many, tall or small, get to the same level from the point of view of co-ordination and technique. In Leo’s case he has added a new dimension to an extraordinary level of excellence. And that isn’t genetic; rather, it is the product of passion and perseverance.
Messi Page 44