Now four times the best player on the planet, Lionel Messi, whose growth is 169 centimeters, claims that overcome the disease in many ways helped him become what he is. Despite his Argentinean origin and Italian blood in his veins, in Catalonia he has long been considered a national hero. And it’s far from a secret that among souvenirs in Barcelona the t-shirts of the local team with the number ten are in greatest demand. Diego Maradonna himself admits that the play of a young talent makes him watch her with his mouth open. Despite this, not every football fan knows that the world could never have known about this nugget, because a stunningly successful career was achieved thanks to victories not only on the football field. The growth of Messi in his youth almost became a sentence for him. However, first things first.
Jorge Messi, Lionel’s father, instilled in his son a love of football in his early childhood. At that time he worked at one of the metallurgical plants, which was located in the city of Rosario. The mother of the future star moonlighted as a cleaner, and the rest of the time she was a housewife. The family, in which, besides Leo, had two more sons and one daughter, lived, to put it mildly, not very richly. However, this did not stop its head from very much loving football and giving him all his free time. He even tried his hand at the coaching bridge of the local team. Jorge was very happy when, at the age of five, Lionel showed a football talent, as a result of which the boy entered the Newell's Old Boys youth team. Even then, the coach spoke of him as a player with a great future. However, two years later trouble came: Messi's growth stopped due to a lack of appropriate hormone.
It should be noted that Lionel always looked like a very fragile guy, but this did not affect his game in any way. At the same time, a medical examination shocked the whole family and sounded like a sentence. In the greatest despair was Jorge, who had a lot of hopes connected with his son. The growth of Messi stopped at around 1.4 meters. This meant that he could remain a dwarf for life. Leo's father did not give up and turned for help to the leaders of many Argentinean clubs, but everywhere he came across a refusal, since the treatment was not cheap. In the end, he decided on the last desperate step - he took the guy to see in Catalan Barcelona. For the family budget, this was very expensive, but faith in Lionel did the trick - in October 2000 he was admitted to the club’s football academy. Moreover, Barcelona not only incurred the costs of treating the guy, which is now estimated at one thousand euros, but also employed his parents in his structure. Especially for young talent, a training and training program was even developed.
After two years of serious therapy, Messi's growth, both physically and professionally, has gone up. The guy did not have any complexes, because he learned to handle the ball perfectly. At the age of sixteen, he made his debut as part of an adult team. At the same time, Leo was so worried about the very fact of sharing the locker room with his football idols that he asked the mentor to let him change clothes in the corridor. Note that in the history of his club, he became the youngest player to enter the field, as well as the youngest player to score a goal for the Catalans. Very soon after his debut in Barca, the footballer was invited to play for the Spanish national football team. However, despite his European achievements, as seen in the photo, Lionel Messi is wholly owned by Argentina.