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AP File Photo
\n20-year-old soccer star Lionel Messi helps to bathe Lamine Yamal, who was merely six months old at the time, during a photo session in Sept. 2007 in the dressing room of the Camp Nou stadium in Barcelona, Spain. The two will meet in the World Cup Final on Sunday as Messi’s Argentina takes on Yamal’s Spain.<\/p>\n
BARCELONA, Spain (AP) \u2014 Almost two decades ago, photographer Joan Monfort didn\u2019t think much of his photo shoot of a teenage Lionel Messi bathing a cute baby boy in a plastic bathtub. Not until the remarkable twist of fate became clear years later, when that infant blossomed into Lamine Yamal.<\/p>\n
Now those images of the long-haired Messi, his hands covered in soap suds as if anointing Yamal as soccer\u2019s Next Big Thing, have become the most talked about \u2014 and gawked about \u2014 in the runup to Sunday\u2019s World Cup final, when Messi\u2019s Argentina will play Yamal\u2019s Spain for the biggest trophy in the sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have never been a believer or thought that anything was destined to occur, but I am beginning to have my doubts. This is beyond all reasonable explanations,\u201d Monfort told The Associated Press from his home in Barcelona on Friday.<\/p>\n
Monfort, who works as a freelance photojournalist for the AP, took the photos in 2007 as part of a charity calendar produced by local newspaper Sport and UNICEF.<\/p>\n
Luck dictated that Yamal\u2019s mother, who appears in the calendar photo, won a raffle of families in the city of Matar\u00f3, near Barcelona, who wanted to participate. Soccer destiny then deemed that her baby boy, who would become a star for Barcelona some 15 years later, was paired up with the Argentine who would become one of the greatest of all time.<\/p>\n
A tearful Messi left Barcelona in 2021 when the club was in financial trouble. Yamal erupted at the club two years later. The journey is now complete, from bathtub to World Cup final, where the 19-year-old Yamal will face a Messi who is 20 years his senior.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is one of the best players in the world right now, so I wish him the best. He\u2019s only 19 years old and he has all of his future ahead,\u201d Messi said in Spanish on Friday. \u201cThat picture, it was crazy. Him as a baby, and now we are facing each other. What a crazy picture. I just wish him the best of luck.\u201d<\/p>\n
The famous photo was forgotten until \u2026<\/p>\n
Monfort had no recollection of the photos until Yamal\u2019s father posted one on social media during the 2024 European Championship, when a teenage Yamal was enjoying his international breakout and led Spain to the title.<\/p>\n
The photo went viral then. But now, with the World Cup final looming, Monfort said, interest in his photos has skyrocketed.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis has exploded all over the world, and the fact that the final is in the U.S. has given it the extra push,\u201d Monfort said. \u201cAnd now this has culminated with the final between Messi and Yamal. It is better than any film script.\u201d<\/p>\n
Monfort said he has been bombarded by queries for the photos by professional media outlets, while also seeing his images reproduced countless times on social media and the internet without any credit or compensation.<\/p>\n
Yamal\u2019s Spain teammate Mikel Merino had the same reaction as most people who see the photos.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe first time I saw it, I thought it was AI and that it wasn\u2019t even real,\u201d Merino said Friday. \u201cIt\u2019s unbelievable that two of the best players to have played the game \u2014 and hopefully Lamine, in the future, will be one of those \u2014 share a picture like that. Hopefully we\u2019re going to see a very bright final with those two protagonists at their best, playing and giving all the fans a great spectacle.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barcelona fans are torn by love of both Messi and Yamal<\/p>\n
Like many Barcelona fans, Monfort\u2019s loyalty is split. It is common to see children wearing both Yamal\u2019s Barcelona and Spain shirts, as well as any Messi shirt, whether from his Barcelona years or Argentina or his current club, Inter Miami, on the city\u2019s streets.<\/p>\n
Monfort, 58, is considering traveling to see the final in New Jersey, but whether he watches it in person or at home, he said he will have trouble cheering for one team or the other.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy heart is split. I don\u2019t know if I want Messi or Yamal to win,\u201d said Monfort, a lifelong Barcelona supporter.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have an everlasting love for the best player of all time (Messi),\u201d he said, but \u201cYamal has broken the mold here\u201d and represents a new, diverse Spain, thanks to his parents from Morocco and Equatorial Guinea. \u201cMaybe they can both win. I wouldn\u2019t rule it out after everything we have seen.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AP File Photo 20-year-old soccer star Lionel Messi helps to bathe Lamine Yamal, who was merely six months…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57347,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[92,11405,8260,23632],"class_list":["post-57346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barcelona","tag-barcelona","tag-messi","tag-uncategorized","tag-yamal-meet-for-world-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57346\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}