4 interesting facts about Lionel Messi that you probably didn’t know
France Football finally announced the winner of the Ballon d’Or trophy or the world’s best soccer player award this year, where the award was won by the Barcelona mega star, Lionel Messi. Yes, this 32-year-old figure successfully defeated two other candidates, Virgil Van Dijk and Cristiano Ronaldo. That is Messi has collected six Ballon d’Or throughout his career as a player, the most in the history of football.
Well, here are some interesting facts about Lionel Messi that are rarely known to the public, what are they?
1. Contract affixed on handkerchief
Messi has officially been signed by Barcelona since he is still 13 years old. At that time, Carles Rexach who worked as a Barcelona talent guide saw the talents and talents that Messi had. He was stunned, then immediately met with the parents of la Pulga. However, at that time due to an urgent and rushed situation, Rexach did not have time to prepare an official contract, finally Messi’s contract at that time was affixed on Handkerchief, of course complete with the signature of the player and his parents.
2. The beginning of Barcelona’s interest
In fact, Carles Rexach did not immediately find Messi, but the club first saw Video Messi while performing his jugling action. At that time, Soldini (one of Barcelona’s agents) gave Messi an orange and a tennis ball. Little Messi then did 113 times jugling with oranges and about 120 times jugling tennis balls without even falling. For this reason, Barcelona sent Carles Rexach to monitor Messi directly.
3. Almost joined the Spanish national team
As we said, Messi was contracted by Barcelona since he was 13 years old, meaning that since then the Argentine star has also settled in Spain. Seeing his glorious performance, it turns out the Spanish National Team had tempted Messi to move citizenship in order to defend La furia Roja on the International stage. But Messi refused, he preferred to defend Argentina, despite the chance for a greater world champion with Spain.
4. Speak Catalan language
Despite having lived for a long time in Catalunya, the fact is that Messi rarely speaks Catalan, even so, he is so fluent in chanting the language. However, Messi once spoke Catalan on the bus during the Barcelona champions’ successful parade.
Messi, who was drunk at the time, took the microphone and shouted, “Visca el Barça, visca Catalunya there is Argentina, la concha de su madre!”