What gave birth to this Messi!

What gave birth to it! Over time! Exactly one year ago Lionel Messi and Barcelona separated. And this Saturday Lionel Messi will start his second season led by PSG’s Qatari fortune. What gave birth to it!

How come? How was it? What happened? These are questions that still haunt Barcelona’s bar rallies that don’t have comprehensive answers and continue to be inundated with conspiracy suspicions. The most serious, that Joan Laporta, the president of the club, “let him go”. A 34-year-old player who had already “given everything” could give Barça little more and had ceased to be profitable. Too much salary and few credits, even if the sponsors continued to support the megastar dressed as a blaugrana. It wasn’t enough for an outdated economy. And the validity of Rosario was doubted.

Those who review the history of the Catalan club, even from a bird’s eye view, should not be surprised. Except for Pele and Beckenbauer, he had the best of every generation. And they all went out the back door. Cruyff, Maradona, Ronaldo, Romario and one could continue. Messi was the last one, so far.

And now he looks used to it “Ici c’est Paris” moving the “Visca Barca”. With Clermont he begins his second season in the club that manages the Qatar Sovereign Fund, the same that the new Minister of Economy Sergio Massa will try to touch his pockets to invest in Argentina. As if everything had to do with everything. What gave birth to it!

From the famous signature on the napkin he gave her Charlie Rexacha glory of Barcelona, ​​Messi has left in the windows of the club 10 leagues, 7 Copas del Rey, 4 Champions League, 3 Club World Cup, 7 Spanish Super Cups and 3 European Super Cups. He left something else: 778 games. And a little more: 672 goals.

The beginning of the end was 2-8 with Bayern Munich in the 2020 Champions League. Then the war, the burofax, the institutional crisis while the treasure was bleeding, the insult to let his friend Luis Suárez free. Background to that August 5, 2021 statement that landed in Buenos Aires at 10:32 a.m., when Messi switched to immortality as a Barcelona footballer.

I was happy. Less than a month earlier he had won the Copa América. In the end he had won something with the Argentine national team. The Scaloneta gained momentum as he derailed the battered train led by Dutchman Koeman. Could it have been avoided? who knows. Could there be a more dignified ending for the player who brought the club back to the Major League, who has brought Real Madrid to their knees more than once? Could? Was it wanted?

He didn’t even enjoy his first year in Paris. Covid. injuries. Benefits of “regular player”. As a champion of the boring Ligue 1 and strident failure against that Madrid always enemy, in the Champions League, riding a wonderful Benzema.

But it all starts again. Moebius striptease in Rosario’s life: until we meet again Pochettino, a farmer but of distant affection, Welcome Galtier. Another year on the assault of the unattainable Champions. Again with Neymar, but now with Mbappé unto PSG’s pagan Pope.

Saturday, visit to Clermont, the first official match but Messi’s gaze is no longer on the Camp Nou, out of the corner of his eye and every now and then, without creating too many problems, he will deal with the clamor and needs of the Parc des Princes. Destiny is another. It’s in November. And he is in Qatar, with the national team. By then, perhaps, with any luck and if the planets align, the questions will come back from the beginning. How did he do? Why did it take so long to be a champion of what it takes to be a champion to become undisputed? And again it will be possible to say, in another tone: what gave birth to him!

What gave birth to this Messi!