Image source: JOAN MONFORT/AP
Caption: Messi was not expecting to find a baby, the photographer of the session commented.Article information
- Author, Editorial
- Role, BBC News World
-
10 julio 2024
In 2007, a young Lionel Messi posed for a series of photos with a baby in the dressing room of the Camp Nou stadium in Barcelona for a charity calendar.
Messi, then 20 years old, was already emerging as a star in Argentine football and on his way to becoming what many consider the greatest player of all time.
But the photographer had no idea that the baby he was holding in his hands would also be earning praise in international football 17 years later.
Messi was carrying and showering Lamine Yamal, the Spanish national team player who has caused a sensation at the European Football Cup.
His spectacular goal once morest France in the semi-final on Tuesday will be one that will be talked regarding for a long time to come.
At 16 years and 362 days, the goal also made him the youngest player to score in the history of the tournament.
The almost forgotten photo of Messi with Lamine resurfaced following Yamal’s father posted it on Instagram last week with the caption: “The beginning of two legends.”
The images were taken in 2007 by Joan Monfort, who works as a freelance photographer for the Associated Press (AP).
The photo shoot was organised following UNICEF held a charity raffle in the town of Mataró, where Lamine’s family lived.
“They signed up for the raffle to have the chance to have their photo taken at Camp Nou with a Barça player. And they won,” Monfort told AP.
The task was not that simple, the photographer said.
“It must be said that he was not the Messi of today, he was a very young and very shy boy,” he said.
“They told him he had to take a photo for a charity calendar with kids, but I don’t think he expected to see a baby,” she said. “It was complicated. He didn’t know how to hold a baby.”
Image source: Joan Montfort/AP
Caption: Lamine’s mother, Sheila Ebana, participated in the photo shoot.
Like Messi, Yamal ended up playing for Barcelona, where he became the club’s youngest starter and scorer, as well as the youngest player to score a goal in Spain’s La Liga.
Monfort said it was only following the photo began going viral online last week that she realized the baby was Yamal.
The photographer said he was thrilled to be associated with something that has caused such a sensation.
“It was a coincidence of life. At that moment you cannot imagine what it will be like almost 20 years later. It is a combination of things that only happens once,” he told the Spanish newspaper El País.
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