When we talk about Lionel Messi, it's easy to talk about numbers. He has been named the best men's player in the world eight times. He has won one World Cup, four European Champions League trophies and an Olympic gold medal. He has scored more than 800 goals for his clubs and his country. But these numbers only tell some of the story. It's also his balance, the way he moves his feet, slides the ball through another player's legs and finds space on the field. Soccer is often called "the beautiful game," and for many people, no one has ever played it quite as beautifully as Messi. His story began in Rosario, Argentina, where he was born in 1987. There, when he was a child, he played for a club called Newell's Old Boys. Clubs around the world soon heard about the young star in South America, and aged 13 he moved with his family to Spain, where he joined FC Barcelona's junior team. By the age of 16, he was already playing for the club's adult team. Goals, then trophies, came quickly, and he never looked back. He was soon a global star, and one of the world's highest paid sportspeople. Messi left Barcelona in 2021, having scored more goals for the club than anyone else. He joined Paris Saint-Germain, and then, two years later, Inter Miami in the US. In 2022, he was Argentina's captain and the star player in his country's World Cup win. Messi, at just 170 centimeters tall, had become a giant of the sport.