A napkin with Lionel Messi’s first Barcelona contract written unofficially has been sold at auction.
Bonhams, a privately owned London-based international auction house, is holding the auction until May 17 with a starting price of £220,000 ($274.55,000) on behalf of the Argentine player’s agent Horacio Gaggioli.
An agreement was reached on December 14, 2000, when Barcelona coach Carles Rexac desperately wanted to sign Messi, who was 13 years old at the time.
Messi impressed during a two-week trial with Barcelona in September 2000, but the club were initially reluctant to sign such a young non-European player.
Rexach became concerned that the Catalan club would miss out on signing Messi upon his return to his hometown of Rosario, Argentina.
Gaggioli said. athletic Last year he informed Rexach in December 2000 that if they were unable to sign Messi the teenager would be offered to other clubs, including Real Madrid.
Rexach invited Gaggioli to dinner in Barcelona to make a final decision on Messi, but there was one problem. Rexach did not have time to write or print the contract, but later needed the relevant signatures for a legally binding document.
His solution was to take a napkin and write down contract language for the parties involved to sign, indicating their legal commitments.
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The napkin had the following written on it: “On December 14, 2000 in Barcelona, in the presence of gentlemen (agent Josep Maria) Minguella and Horacio (Gaggioli), Carles Rexach, technical secretary of FCB, committed himself under his charge. “This is the opinion of others who are against signing Lionel Messi as long as the agreed fee is maintained.”
Rexach signed the napkin alongside football agents Minguella and Gaggioli, who have been involved in several Barca deals in the past, including that of Diego Maradona.
“This is one of the most thrilling items I have ever handled,” said Ian Ehling, head of fine books and manuscripts at Bonhams New York. “Yes, it’s a paper napkin, but it’s the famous napkin from the early days of Lionel Messi’s career.
“It changed the life of Messi, the future of FC Barcelona, and played a key role in bringing some of football’s most glorious moments to billions of fans around the world.”
Messi debuted at Barcelona in 2004 and scored 672 goals in 778 games before leaving in 2021. (Lluis Gene/AFP via Getty Images)
Commenting on the incident years later, Gaggioli called it an “amazing moment.”
“That napkin broke the deadlock,” he added.
“My lawyer saw it. The napkin had everything on it: my name, his name, the date. It was notarized. It was a legal document.
“This will be a part of me for the rest of my life. Napkins will always be with me. “I live in Andorra and I kept that napkin in a safe at the bank.”
On Wednesday, Minguela told Radio Catalunya that the napkin had been in his office for years and that he had offered Barcelona the opportunity to display it in the club’s museum.
He said he had not received a response from Barcelona and claimed he would now ask a lawyer to find out who the legal owner of the napkins was and how he could prove they were in legal possession in order to sell them.
Minguela insisted that he did not want to profit from the napkins, but would prefer to see them in person at a Barcelona museum or donate the money to the club’s foundation if they were sold.
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(Pascal Le Segretin/Getty Images)
