The auction for the napkin that famously kickstarted Lionel Messi’s career at Barcelona when he was just 13 years old has commenced this week, with an estimated price range of £300,000–£500,000 ($374,700–$624,500).
Current bidding for the item has reached £220,000, and the auction, hosted by the British auction house Bonhams, will remain open until May 17.
Originally scheduled for March, the auction was delayed due to a dispute over the ownership of the napkin, which has been in the possession of Horacio Gaggioli, an Argentine agent, for the past two decades.
Josep Minguella, another adviser involved in Messi’s transfer to Barcelona, has also laid claim to the napkin after news broke of its auction earlier this year.
Gaggioli disputed this, while Bonhams told ESPN there were “no problems” regarding the sale of the napkin, which is listed on their website as “property of Horacio Gaggioli.”
Minguella has yet to respond to ESPN’s request for comment. The story dates back to 2000 when Lionel Messi’s father, Jorge, began to express doubts about Barcelona’s commitment to his son’s development. At that time, Carles Rexach, the club’s director of football, hastily arranged an agreement on a napkin.
This impromptu contract was signed by Rexach, Minguella, who played a role in bringing Messi to Barcelona from South America, and Gaggioli, who facilitated the deal. It served as a promise for Messi’s first professional contract.
Since then, the napkin has been kept by Gaggioli in a secure vault in Andorra, a principality located north of Barcelona between Spain and France. Attempts to negotiate its inclusion in Barcelona’s museum at the Camp Nou stadium have fallen through in the past.
The agreement on the napkin was made on December 14, 2000, at a tennis club in Barcelona after Rexach received an urgent call from Jorge Messi, threatening to take his son back to Argentina.
“That was when, thinking on my feet, I decided everything,” Rexach told ESPN in 2020 to mark the 20th anniversary of the signing.
“Why a napkin? Because it was the only thing I had available to hand. I saw the only way to relax Jorge was signing something, giving him some proof, so I asked for a napkin from the waiter.
“I wrote: ‘In Barcelona, on December 14, 2000 and in the presence of Messrs Minguella and Horacio, Carles Rexach, FC Barcelona’s sporting director, hereby agrees, under his responsibility and regardless of any dissenting opinions, to sign the player Lionel Messi, provided that we keep to the amounts agreed upon.’
“I told Jorge that my signature was there and that there were witnesses, that with my name I would take direct responsibility, that there was nothing else to talk about and to be patient for a few days because Leo could already consider himself a Barca player.”