The famous autograph of the young Argentine sealed his move to Barcelona in December 2000
The famous napkin Lionel Messiwhich officially certified his transition to Barcelona in 2000, was sold at auction for the equivalent of 965 thousand dollars.
According to auction house Bonhams, the final price of the lot was 762,400 pounds sterling (just under 0.9 million euros) excluding administrative fees. The auction was conducted on behalf of Horacio Gaggioli, an Argentine football agent.
The legendary deal took place at the Barcelona Tennis Club on December 14, 2000. It was attended by the aforementioned Gaggioli, 13-year-old Lionel and his father Jorge Messi, another agent Josep Mraya Minghella and Barcelona representative Carles Rexac, at that time the sporting director.
Reshak asked the waiter for a clean piece of paper, received a napkin and wrote down on it in blue ink the text of the contract that Jorge Messi had been trying to get for his son from Barcelona for a long time. The interested parties then left signatures on it.
Young Messi moved to Barcelona from the youth structure of the Argentine Newells. From 2005 to 2021, Lionel won every possible trophy with the Blaugrana, played a total of 778 matches, in which he completed 975 effective actions. Then he moved to PSG, and since the summer of 2023 he has been a player at Inter Miami.
The Argentine has won the Ballon d’Or award a record eight times. The national team includes the 2022 world champion.
Source: Sportarena
I’m Scott Moore, a professional writer and journalist based in the US. I’ve been writing for various publications for over 8 years now, and have been working as an author at athletistic for the past five years. My work has been featured by some of the leading sports websites and magazines across Europe.
