{"id":47214,"date":"2026-10-05T13:44:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T11:44:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=47214"},"modified":"2026-10-05T13:44:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T11:44:16","slug":"messi-farewell-closes-a-long-hard-won-love-story-with-argentina","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/messi-farewell-closes-a-long-hard-won-love-story-with-argentina\/","title":{"rendered":"Messi farewell closes a long, hard-won love story with Argentina"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>When Lionel Messi makes his final appearance for Argentina on Tuesday, it will bring to an end a journey that began with the country\u2019s football authorities not even knowing his name and evolved into one of the most enduring relationships in sporting history.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The farewell against Benin \u200bat Buenos Aires\u2019 Monumental stadium ends an international career spanning more than two decades, which began with Argentina scrambling to identify \u200ca teenage prodigy developing far from home.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cHe went through so many moments that they\u2019re really very different eras. At first he suffered enormously with the national team. He truly endured it,\u201d Argentine journalist and author Sergio Levinsky, who wrote \u201cMessi and Everything Else\u201d, told Reuters.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Messi moved to Barcelona as a teenager and, while Spain tried to persuade him to represent them, \u200bhis own country barely knew he existed.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>At the 2003 Under-17 World Cup in Finland, Spain beat Argentina 3-2 after extra time in the \u200bsemi-finals.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>According to Levinsky, a young Cesc Fabregas, who scored twice and was Messi\u2019s teammate at Barcelona\u2019s La Masia academy, \u2060told Argentine delegates afterwards: \u201cYou lost to us because we\u2019ve got your best player at Barcelona and he\u2019s a genius.\u201d<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Argentina youth coach Hugo Tocalli recalled a \u200bsimilar encounter. He said at the Ole Summit last month that Spain\u2019s head chef told him Argentina needed \u201ca kid who plays in Barcelona\u201d to win the \u200btournament.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Finding the boy from Rosario proved difficult.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Argentine Football Association (AFA) employee Omar Souto tracked down the Messi family in Spain through a Rosario telephone directory, only to ask for \u201cLeonardo\u201d.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cHis name isn\u2019t Leonardo, it\u2019s Lionel,\u201d Souto was told, according to the documentary \u201cMessi: The Forgotten Tape\u201d.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The confusion even extended to the paperwork.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The AFA sent Barcelona a fax asking about a player called \u201cMecci,\u201d \u200bspelling the surname with a double \u201cc\u201d because officials believed he might be Italian, Levinsky said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":37341,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-47214","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Messi moved to Barcelona as a teenager and, while Spain tried to persuade him to represent them, \u200bhis own country barely knew he existed.","published_date":"","news_description":"Messi moved to Barcelona as a teenager and, while Spain tried to persuade him to represent them, \u200bhis own country barely knew he existed.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47214\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47215,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47214\/revisions\/47215"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37341"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=47214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}