{"id":2829,"date":"2026-05-08T19:03:42","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T19:03:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=2829"},"modified":"2026-05-08T19:03:42","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T19:03:42","slug":"from-grandoli-to-the-world-cup-the-neighborhood-club-where-messis-journey-started","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=2829","title":{"rendered":"From Grandoli to the World Cup: The neighborhood club where Messi\u2019s journey started"},"content":{"rendered":"

By D\u00c9BORA REY<\/strong><\/p>\n

ROSARIO, Argentina (AP) \u2014 The breeze off the Paran\u00e1 River brings a chill to the afternoon in Rosario. As the kids warm up, the clatter of their tiny cleats intensifies until the referee signals for the players to enter the pitch.<\/p>

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They\u2019re wearing the orange and white-striped jersey of Abanderado Grandoli, the neighborhood club where Lionel Messi\u2019s soccer journey started 34 years ago. From a nearby building, a mural of a young Messi watches over the children as they chase the ball.<\/p>\n

Just maybe, years from now, one of them will be compared to Rosario\u2019s most famous son, arguably the best soccer player of all time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI watched him when I was little and it made me want to play like him,\u201d said Juli\u00e1n Silvera, an 11-year-old who particularly admires Messi\u2019s free kicks.<\/p>\n

The final chapter of Messi\u2019s glorious soccer career has yet to be written \u2013 in a few weeks, the 38-year-old Inter Miami captain is expected to play in his sixth World Cup for Argentina, though he hasn\u2019t officially confirmed it. That story began here, in a lower-middle-class district of Rosario, Argentina\u2019s third-largest city and an industrial hub that was also the birth place of revolutionary Ernesto \u201cChe\u201d Guevara.<\/p>\n

It was in 1992 when his maternal grandmother, Celia, took 5-year-old Lionel to watch his older brother, Mat\u00edas, play for Grandoli in one of Rosario\u2019s youth leagues.<\/p>\n

How Messi ended up on the pitch has become part of the club\u2019s lore: One player was missing for a seven-a-side match for 6-year-olds, and Celia saw an opportunity for her tiny but gifted grandson. She argued with the coach, Salvador Aparicio, to put him on.<\/p>

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\u201cAparicio didn\u2019t want him to because he was too young for the age group,\u201d Ezequiel Assales, who was Messi\u2019s teammate at Grandoli in those early years, told The Associated Press. \u201cThe grandmother insisted. They put him on, and everyone said, \u2018What a player!\u2019 That\u2019s how it all started.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Spanish journalist Guillem Balagu\u00e9, author of the only authorized biography of Messi, the coach thought the game would be too rough for the little boy, who already was showing signs of the growth impediment for which he would later seek treatment. He decided to put Messi on the right wing, where he could be close to his grandmother.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you see him cry or get scared, take him out,\u201d Aparicio told the woman, according to Balagu\u00e9\u2019s account.<\/p>\n

Aparicio, who died in 2008, described in several interviews how Messi failed to control the ball the first time it came his way. But the next play, he received it with his left foot and dribbled past a series of opponents. A legend was born.<\/p>

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