We knew it was coming, but Lionel Messi’s retirement from international football still feels momentous.
In 2005, when he made his international debut as a floppy-haired 18-year-old, pen and paper were what he would have still used at school, or in the La Masia academy classrooms. (The first iPhone was still two years away.)
I can say for sure that I always gave everything, not only in the last few years when we won everything [but] before as well, and I always fought and gave everything for the shirt, to give you joy and make you proud of being Argentinian through football. Twenty-one years on, Messi hasn’t just earned the tag; for many, he has surpassed his idol on pure footballing terms. But even the greatest among us can carry within them a sense of not having done enough. Messi’s retirement note was a window to the vulnerable person behind the genius on the pitch. “It is a decision that hurts my soul but I know it is time. Half of Messi’s note is about him trying to prove he poured heart and soul out on the pitch.
He is the most-decorated footballer of all time, with 46 trophies; the highest assist-provider and second-highest goal-scorer in the game’s history; has a record eight Ballon D’Ors, two Copa America titles (2021 and ’24) and a World Cup (Qatar; 2022).
His two minutes were still enough for the world to declare the arrival of a “new Maradona”, an idea that had been building since he singlehandedly won Argentina the World Youth Championship cup a couple of months earlier. A “Maradona” tag can feel like a curse; how does one live up to that level of expectation: a footballer so gifted as to be considered a god, who won Argentina the World Cup at 25, with a performance so dazzling it was like nothing ever seen at a World Cup before (with five goals and five assists, Maradona carried the team to its win). “The greatest ever” may be a subjective and perhaps meaningless term, but when it comes to numbers and accolades, Messi certainly is that. “After the time that has passed since the final, thinking a lot, I want to let everyone know that I am retiring from the national team,” he wrote.
In that debut match, against Hungary, the teen lasted less than two minutes before being sent off for a foul that, today, would likely have seen the red card overturned by a Video Assistant Referee (VAR).
In 2016, when Argentina lost the Copa to Chile, it was the fourth straight defeat in a major final for the team. “I love, have loved and I will always love being part of the national team. I have emptied myself: now I have nothing more to give,” he wrote. For more than a decade after his debut, Messi failed to do what Maradona had done: drag the Argentine team, over-reliant on his skills, to a World Cup triumph. A tsunami of criticism followed: he didn’t care for his country, he only played well for Barcelona, was only interested in individual glory, lacked the emotion and intensity that made Maradona great; they even claimed he didn’t sing the national anthem with fervour. Perhaps now, after two Copas, a World Cup title and three World Cup finals, Messi can finally lay both the burdens and joys of wearing the blue-and-white colours to rest. (Email Rudraneil Sengupta on rudraneil@ gmail.com. The views expressed are personal)
