The coach promised him two goal-to-head cookies, Messy waited his whole life for this day.

Best time to remember his way.

It all started in Rosario. In this field of poor Grandol team. But first Leo didn't even have a ball, he collected it from plastic bottles and socks. That was said by his brothers, Rodrigo and Matias.

Then Newell's Old Boys. There Messy had a special motivation to never stop and destroy everyone around. At one time, Coach Carlos Marcon offered him chocolate cookies with caramel milk in it. If Messy scores 4 goals, he gets 4 cookies”, coach said at the time. To make Leon progress even stronger, the coach promised him two goal-to-head cookies. “Almost next match, Leo defeated all the defense and goalkeeper, then threw the ball and scored head to the empty gate. When Messy was 9, Newell's English trainers thought something was wrong with Leon. All my friends grew older, while Mess remained very short, three feet [1 m] seven inches [27 cm].

This did not affect the success of the children's tournaments, but it would lead to major problems in the long - term plan. So nine-year-old Mess discovered a lack of growth hormone, which is very important for body maturity.

So Mess began to inject the growth hormone. I was the youngest in the field, the youngest in school, the youngest in the yard. So every day they gave me a foot injection. Day after day, week after week, and so forth for more than three years”, Messy said.

Indeed, on the road to recovery, Mess faced a tragic challenge. In the late 1990s, and in the early 2000 ' s, Argentina was plagued by a powerful economic crisis, which in 2001 led to a bankruptcy, the president's resignation and the middle class collapse.

The first two years of Messi treatment were paid by the steel factory's insurance fund, where Lionel Messi's father worked. When the crisis finally flared, all insurance payments were cut, and Messie was left without injections of the growth hormone. The injection course cost between $900 and $1300 a month, and the family had no such money.

Mess's father, Jorge first addressed Newell's management Old Boys he hoped the club would save the boy, but he was wrong, because the crisis also affected football clubs. The Messy family urgently requested rescue options.

“There are no side effects from a ban, but if Leo stopped taking the hormone, he would now be much shorter”, said doctor Schwarzstein.

Soon, the Messy family was assisted by two entrepreneurs from Buenos Aires, who had heard of the remarkable talent of the Mess and had become acquainted with Barcelona representatives. So met Jorge Messi (Messas ' father) with Josep Maria Minguella, one of Barcelona's most important employees, among those who have never appeared in public. After I saw the video in detail, I was just amazed at”, remembers Minguela. It seemed that Leo came to us from an extraordinary planet where extraordinary people are born - architects, doctors, great musicians. Barcelona was not initially particularly interested in Messin, but Minguela did everything to change the club's position. He bought tickets for Lionel and his father to Spain and even paid for the accommodation in Barcelona.

Messy trained, and he played. But time passed and the results did not appear. Mess's father no longer believed that anything would happen to Barcelona. He seemed to the Catalans, like Newells Old Boys, would cheat and offer no contracts.

To calm Jorge Messin, Minguella and another Barcelona manager, Rexac, prepared a temporary deal. It was written on December 14, 2000, in a napkin at a restaurant in Montjulic. The agreement assured that Messy will soon sign a full contract for young people. At the same time, Lionel's father was guaranteed a position in Barcelona's youth system.

The documents were prepared by March 2001 and treatment requested as soon as possible. As a result, the first course of growth hormone injections was paid by Barcelona CEO Joan Lacueva.

For good reason: After several years Mess broke out at Barcelona base. And madness began:

Messi won 10 titles from La League, 7 Cups

4 times Champions League, 3 times U's Supercup EFA and 3 times the World Cup for Club

7 times it won “Golden Cup”, the favorite for the 8th. • La League's best scorer 8 times, with the best goal scorer in the history of La League with 474 goals to 311 of Cristiano Ronaldo in second place.

And in this amazing setting, all Leo had on the long national team was victory at the World Cup for youth (U-20) in 2005 and the 2008 Olympic gold medal. Everything's wrong.

At the World Championship:

2006 A quarterfinal Elimination from Germany (1:1, 2:4 in penalty) 2010 final loss from Germany (0:1) 2018 A decrease to 1/ 8 finals from France (3:4)

In other finals:

2007 Loss of the Cup America final in Brazil (0:3) 2015 Loss of the Cupa America from Chile (0.0, 1:4 in penalty) 2016 loss in the Cupa America final of Chile (0.0, 2: 4 in penalty).

After that defeat in 2016, Messie even declared his national withdrawal. He was tired of everything, the lack of results, and the severest pressure of many fans, and the chaos in the federation, due to which Messi paid the national guards out of his own pocket in 2016 because of federation debts.

I've always felt the passion of the Argentineans. But there's a group of people who constantly suspect me. They had a thought of my every move. No more positive opinion.

In 2006, I almost did not play, and even then they began to criticize me. I could never understand why they tried to hurt me”, Leo said.

Messy returned national a week later. I'm very much in love with my country, I want to play nationals. There are so many problems in Argentina football. I wouldn't want to create anything new. I just want to take advantage of the national team, and it's better to do this by being inside of it”, he apologized Leo. He later acknowledged that the decision to leave was spontaneous and very unexpected.

Suffering ended only with the arrival of Lionel Scalon as a coach of the Argentina national in 2018.

In 2021, Messi won the first adult final with Argentina, they defeated Brazil (1: 0) in the decisive American Cup match.

I have many times left the field disappointed, but I knew the result would come. I'm grateful to God for giving me this moment, it couldn't be better: Brazil against Brazil.

Many times I have dreamed of it. I dedicate my victory to my family - my marriage mate, my children, my parents, my brothers and sisters, who have suffered many times, like me, or worse. Many times we had to go on vacation and spend a few days frustrated with nothing to win, but this time it's different.

I think we still don't understand what we did, we became champions. We're happy and celebrate. This final will go into history, we beat Brazil in Brazil”, said the happy Messy then.

The other defeat of Italy (3:0) in the match for Finalissima.

But all this is nothing against the background of the grand goal that Leo was going through all these years.

This is probably my last World. The last opportunity to realise my and our shared dream”, Messy said before the start of the 2022 World Cup. We should do what we usually do. We feel good”

And Messie did it. At the last world championship in his career, he took the title. Amazing.