Named after a music star
Have you ever seen Messi’s name Lionel familiar, similar to the name of a certain famous character? That familiar feeling turned out to be well-founded. Lionel Messi’s name is named after the famous singer Lionel Richie.
Messi was born in 1987, just a year after Lionel Richie released the hit album “Dancing on the Ceiling”. As crazy fans of Lionel Richie, Messi’s parents decided to give their son the name Lionel similar to the idol’s name.
Go to the Spanish dictionary
There are many different ways to honor Messi ‘s outstanding playing talent . In it, the Spanish dictionary compilers have a very unique way. In 2017, they created a new word inspired by Messi.
That’s the word “inmessionante”. This word means “the perfect way to play football”. If any player is to be described with the word “inmessionante”, it is indeed a great honor.
Messi is the inspiration for the new word added to the Spanish dictionary
Having a distant relative with Bojan Krkic
Messi turns out to be Bojan’s cousin. The two are related for four generations. Messi and Bojan share the same ancestor Mariano Perez Miralles in Spain.
Roughly, the Messi family and the Bojan family share the same roots in Spain from the 19th century. It is no coincidence that members of the Messi family and the Bojan family members share the middle name Perez.
The other two cousins are also players
In addition to his distant cousin Bojan, who also shared the same color as Barca , Messi also has 2 other cousins who also play professional football. The first is midfielder Emmanuel Biancucchi. One year younger than Messi, Emmanuel Biancucchi grew up from the training camp of Newell’s Old Boys after many years wandering through Germany, Paraguay, Brazil and Peru, and returned to work for Newell’s Old Boys.
The second is striker Maxi Biancucchi. 3 years older than Messi, Maxi Biancucchi all his career played for teams in the Americas. At the teams he joined, Maxi Biancucchi was often called by his teammates by the nickname Messi’s cousin.
Meaningful celebration
After each scoring situation, Messi often raises two index fingers and faces up to the sky. This is Messi’s way of paying tribute to his grandmother Celia Olivera Cuccittini.
Celia Olivera has a special role in Messi’s career. It was she who urged Messi’s parents to buy him the first football boots in his life. It was she who wholeheartedly encouraged Messi to pursue a professional football career. She herself once affirmed: “One day you will become the best player in the world”. Unfortunately, Messi’s grandmother died in 1998, when he was 11 years old.
Impress from oranges and felt balls
Messi’s first agent, Fabian Soldini, revealed that Barca scouts “fell in love” with Messi right after watching a video of him showing off his skills in pitching oranges and tennis balls.
Soldini said: “I still vividly remember the day I went to give Lionel a pound of oranges and some tennis balls. I told him to practice pitching oranges and playing tennis balls very well so that after a week I would film again. A week later, Lionel raised a cam with 113 touches and a tennis ball with 120 touches. I sent the tape to Barcelona and they told me to introduce Lionel right away.”
Messi = Ronaldinho + Deco
This is the shirt number equality. When he first joined Barca’s first team, Messi wore a 30 shirt. The seemingly innocuous number 30 turned out to be very meaningful to Messi.
Messi’s golden feet sold for $5.25 million
That day, Messi was specially coached by two Barca stars, Ronaldinho and Deco. Messi chose the number 30 shirt, which is simply the addition of Ronaldino’s number (10) and Deco’s number (20).
Shy like Messi
Those who have known Messi from the past have the same comment that from childhood to adulthood, he was quite shy in communication. Messi finds it very difficult every time he has to talk to someone on the phone.
So Messi was afraid to call. Having exchanged anything with anyone, he often chooses the texting option.