Messi doesn’t look for records, records look for him

For an athlete who can record his performance with a stopwatch or measurement, breaking the record will be the ultimate goal of his sports life. His pictures live forever in the immovable pantheon of history. Sometimes, however, the fate of memory is cruel and unfair to the women and men who achieve that ecstasy, and today you must seek them out, find out who they are, who they are…

This record has stayed in the popular memory like the frankness of the most beautiful flower, Rose. Like a glowing butterfly, less than a week or two at most. Let’s look at some simple examples: The current 100m champion – what a pedigree – is Fred Kerley, but the clear reference is Usain Bolt. Even earlier in the epic age of sports legend, the famous JC Owens won the test at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, forcing Hitler to his feet and waiting respectfully for the American flag to be raised with the incantation of the national anthem. . History precedes brand offering eternity.

Does anyone dare discuss Schumacher or Hamilton, seven world champions in F1, or the monster Verstappen to come? impossible. But the benchmark of all this is Fangio. That is eternity. Great men don’t need records to reach the paradigmatic category: Muhammad Ali, Diego, Pele don’t need statistics; they don’t need statistics. They’re always great because they’re the best, not necessarily about number of fights, goals or titles. They are the authors of their own legends. The untouchable god of the incorrigible parishioners.

The same thing happened with Messi, but with less controversy as numbers were added to the consistent notion of its unrivaled size. What’s more, it can be said that he does not look for the record, but the record looks for him, and he naturally achieves it. They are the result of an aggregate of increasingly valuable performances, but do not constitute the end of their exploits. He does not propose them, they are his happiness and glory today; deserved and enjoyed.

It’s worth inserting a short paragraph of personal experience to explain the surprising truth of what happened when Messi set a new record in MSL. And it was in my teenage years that I had the opportunity to see the “glorious return” of the two “eternal” protagonists in the universal recognition of Argentine football. It doesn’t matter which team you are a fan of; what matters is which team you are a fan of. Instead, it’s about how you calmly enjoy the sublime game of the masters.

That’s how I managed to get my mother to allow me to go to the Ferro stadium when José Manuel Moreno “Charro” came back to Argentina, after going through Boca in the early 50’s, just to see the huge Moreno. . I was 13 years old, and I had the honor of meeting that monster from River Machines, who came back to the country after becoming a Mexican football icon. Moreno is also a player loved by Boca fans. What a wonderful and peculiar case…these are social luxuries of the past…a year later, in 1954, as a fan of San Lorenzo, I extended my 84 tram ride in Gauna and Terrada The journey from my hometown to the old neighborhood of Flores, to Avenida de la Plata, and the 14-block walk from Rosario to Inclán, where there is the Old Gasometer, is The best venues in Buenos Aires to watch and enjoy football. There, in the preliminaries of the reserve team, René Pontoni played and his return made the Colombian fall in love. The idol of all of us, “The Raven”, including Reverend Jorge Bergoglio, with whom we once looked satisfactorily surprised after a game at Pontoni. Yes, his name is Rene, “…he can’t have another name because it’s also a feminine soft name for him with the ball” as my friend El Vico once said in “El Grafico” as written.

They were Moreno’s flashes, seeing how the ball filtered between the defenders so that Lugo or Galabal went hand in hand with the opposing goalkeeper. Superb touch. Like Pontoni, propped up on his left knee, he looked up to see where Sanfilippo was going, and he taught Sanfilippo a big-scorer trade by pointing his finger at the open space where he’d find the ball Already prepared. Shoot and score.

That’s all we’re craving because Moreno and Pontoni are both in their mid-30s and they’ve played three or four games without a run to keep the fans happy. We left the field contented…we saw magic in the three passes and two dribbles. In the future, as better physics reveals, other cracks will exceed these expectations. What I know: Diego, Veron, Jory Dominguez, Cavenaghi, Maxi Rodriguez, Militos, Roman, Carney… so many, dozens. “But be careful – we said that at the time – we don’t ask for too much because they’re in their 30s and they’re here to show their love for the shirt…”.

It was today, seeing the 35-year-old Messi, always asking him to finish free-kicks, to play the full 90 minutes, to sting like Barcelona in the early days, to have installed Inter Miami with the idea of ​​adding passion to admiration and now only him challenge, you have to get excited. Messi runs, instructs, asks, gestures, talks to referees, leads teammates. More people try to use his magic to excite North American fans. It was so difficult, costly and lengthy that Pele, Beckenbauer, Chinaglia, Cruyff and many other greats never made it.

Of course, this task is not easy. First of all, football – as it is called around the world – is not called soccer in the US – it is the term we are getting used to – because the NFL (National Football League) has exclusive rights to register the term. Take part in his exciting American Football Tournament. This league and other major leagues like the NBA, hockey, baseball and even boxing have always looked at football or soccer as potential rivals since in the 70’s the cake was distributed in the air channels and later in the sports cable , then on PPV, and now on various platforms. That’s why what Messi achieved in Miami with Inter will be the beginning of a miraculous process. He will not be the one to accomplish this goal, because there is no football without passion, and passion has spanned at least three generations. But going from curiosity to surprise, and wonder to admiration in such a short period of time is very promising. And become the daily news and image of the major media in the United States.

We saw him again last night. The opening goal took everyone by surprise. He then scored the first of 22 penalties that would eventually lead to Inter Miami’s title. Although he has achieved records, he is not looking for any records, because with all great men of any era, these numbers are the result of achievement, not the end. Messi, like other greats, cannot be explained by numbers. It’s epic, and that’s its own history. The gods are not tied to another goal or new title: their eternity is guaranteed by those blissful days that cannot possibly be forgotten.

Let’s admire this child prodigy and be with him for the moments he deserves Messi is not happy because he won, but he won because he is happy.