It's hard to believe but even after Lionel Messi arrived at Barcelona, he was barely known in Argentina. One article in the El Grafico magazine changed the situation overnight - here is how it happened.
In 2003, Marcelo Orlandini, a journalist from El Grafico, was working on an article about European clubs discovering talents from South America. That was when he saw Messi's name for the first time.
Marcelo Orlandini, the man who discovered Messi for Argentinean fans:
For further details, Orlandini turned to former Newell's defender, Sebastian Enrique Dominguez who said: "Barcelona took the great Argentine phenomenon. His name is Lionel Messi.
"I met him at seven years old, in a football school. The kid could do things that defied the laws of physics, like Maradona."
The Maradona comparison was brought up again when Marcelo Orlandini called ex-Blaugrana Carles Rexach who was the coordinator of Barcelona's youth teams back then.
"Messi? I signed him in 30 seconds," Rexach said. "In my 40 years of football, I had never seen anything like it. Out of five goal situations, he converts four. And he has exceptional skills. They reminded me of the prime Maradona.
"I signed his first contract, symbolically, on a napkin: I wanted to hire him as soon as possible, couldn't let him slip away."
Now, when someone is likened to Maradona, that should draw attention, right? However, back then, every talented Argentinean footballer was branded 'new Maradona' just like today anyone who can give an assist or convert a direct free-kick is often called 'new Messi'.
No wonder, El Grafico's chief editor wasn't overly impressed when Orlandini told him he had found a 'new Maradona'. To prove his point, Orlandini called Hugo Tocalli, who was the coach of the Argentine youth teams. Here's the dialogue that followed.
'Hugo, do you know the kid Messi?' - 'Who?!' - 'Lionel Messi, an Argentine kid who is in Barcelona.' - 'Ah, yes, yes! We are keeping an eye on him.'
In fact, Tocalli knew nothing about Messi but didn't want to admit it. Orlandini wasn't giving up and found the phone number of Jorge Messi, Leo's father. That was a crucial move - the journalist asked Messi Sr to send some videos of his son to the magazine.
A week later, the videos arrived and no member of the editorial team could believe their eyes: that teenager really WAS a new Maradona.
It didn't take them long to complete and publish an article on the wonder kid. The Argentine Federation bosses realised they needed to hurry if they wanted to have Messi play for Argentina. Spain was already considering naturalising Messi as their player at the time.
Marcelo Orlandini's article on Messi in El Grafico:
A friendly game between Argentina U20s and Paraguay was organised specially to let Messi play for the Albiceleste.
Two and a half years later, Messi was going to his first World Cup with Argentina. AFA president Julio Grondona said that year: "I'm going to Germany with the same feeling I had in the 1986 World Cup because today Argentina has a player who makes the difference; Lionel Messi."
His first World Cup game was against Serbia and Montenegro - Leo was 18 years and 358 days old. The wonder kid set up a Hernan Crespo goal after just three minutes on the pitch and scored ten minutes later. He became the sixth-youngest scorer in the history of the World Cup.
Unfortunately for Argentina, they didn't go further than the quarter-finals where they were stopped by Germany on penalties.
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