SOCCER
Former agent reveals how Real Madrid tried to sign Lionel Messi from Barcelona
Horacio Gagioli says Barça’s Clásico rivals tried to prise Messi away from Catalonia as he was breaking into the first team.
Lionel Messi will go down in the history as one of the greatest soccer players of all time and as a Barcelona icon. However, the Argentina captain and Inter Miami star could have ended up on the other side of the Clásico divide as a Real Madrid legend.
Why did Lionel Messi turn down Real Madrid?
Speaking to Arab sports platform Kooora, Horacio Gagioli, Messi’s former agent, has revealed his client was offered the change to move to Barça’s arch rivals as a teenager but that his commitment to the Catalans was greater than his desire to join Los Blancos.
“Real Madrid were interested when Messi was young, he was 16 or 17 years old. But Leo never wanted to leave Barcelona. Arsenal also showed interest in Messi in the early days, but the response was the same,” Gagioli said.
Messi rapid rise to Barcelona stardom
After making his competitive first-team debut under Frank Rijkaard three months after turning 17, he was already an undisputed star by the time he was 19. He arguably peaked under Pep Guardiola, winning his first Ballon d’Or at the age of 22 in 2009 having finished third and second in the two previous years.
At the time of Real Madrid’s reported interest, Messi had been with Barcelona for three years. The story goes that he agreed to join the club at the age of 13 by signing a napkin, which was recently auctioned for almost a million dollars.
Carlos Rexach, a former Barcelona player and future manager, was working as a scout and pledged to sign the Argentine youngster no matter the cost. Of course, it proved to be well worth the effort, with Messi’s first-team breakthrough coming a little over three years later. As you would expect, all of the world’s top teams tried to prise him away, to no avail.
Messi forced to leave Barcelona
Messi’s career at Barcelona spanned more than two decades until August 5, 2021, a fateful day.
The Inter Miami captain was essentially forced to leave the club of his dreams because of the financial issues that still haunt the club to this day.
“He went through very difficult times,” Gagioli said of his former client. “Leo really did not want to leave the club, but circumstances arose that forced him to go”.