The city where the players of the Argentine national team Lionel Messi and Ángel Di María practiced their first dribbling, and where their current coach, Lionel Scaloni, was also born, beats the start of the World Cup in Qatar with graffiti and public shows in the club where “Lio” took his first steps, and he is proud of them with a mural and “encouragement” activities organized at the popular National Collectives Festival, in front of the Flag Monument.
Rosario, the main city of the province of Santa Fe, is the “cradle of the flag” due to the decision of General Manuel Belgrano to raise the national emblem there for the first time on February 27, 1812, and it is also, by tradition, cradle of great football figures who contributed their talent to the National Team.
Mario Kempes, Jorge Valdano, Gabriel Batistuta, Abel Balbo, César Luis Menotti and Marcelo Bielsa a few years ago, Javier Mascherano, Maxi Rodríguez and Ezequiel Lavezzi closer in time, make up an incomplete list of the Rosario harvest for the soccer team, inside and off the field of play.
In the city that “lives football” through its historic classic between Central and Newell’s, but also in the neighborhood clubs and in the paddocks that still linger as an echo of other times, the imminence of the World Cup in Qatar can be sensed in the flag of the El Campito club, located in the southern area of Rosario, where Messi played as a child before joining the youth ranks at Newell’s.
There, throughout this week, the managers of the humble neighborhood club called on the residents to color the cordons and walls in light blue and white, while professional muralists take care of the figure of Lio Messi.
The Grandoli neighborhood, where Lionel did his first dribbling, wears a party dress with light blue and white garlands, Argentine flags and colorful murals with the figure of the captain of the National Soccer Team.
Grandoli, “Messi’s neighborhood” as it is known in Rosario, is painted light blue and white.
Every corner and house in the neighborhood appears with a mural, flag or a wall with its figure drawn.
The epicenter of all this movement is the corner of Lavalleja and Juan Manuel de Rosas, where the El Campito club is located. As the afternoon fell today, the bustle of neighbors carrying flags, paint buckets and spray paint was intense.
Grandoli shines with the national colors. Even the curbs on the sidewalk have been painted light blue and white. Neighbors and onlookers observe the work of the muralists who this afternoon gave the last touches to the murals alluding to Messi.
“The idea has been around for several years and all this is to give energy and good vibes to the national football team and to Lio Messi”, Diego Vallejos, a member of the El Campito club, and who played soccer with Messi when they were both children, told Télam.
Vallejos said that “whenever a World Cup is played we have this imprint of decorating the neighborhood, placing garlands and painting murals.”
“This time three murals will be painted. One in the club, another in the corner of Messi’s house and another, around the corner from the house,” he said, adding that “with the neighbors we designed pennants, we painted the laces of the streets and we put color in the neighborhood”.
He said that in addition to the intervention of plastic artists, graffiti and murals, “we will also add musical shows with the participation of different artists so that these days we have rock, cumbia and trap.”
Meanwhile, the plastic artist, Lautaro Musse, who arrived in Rosario from Australia to paint one of the murals alluding to the captain of the team, said he felt “proud and excited” for painting a “Child Messi” from when he played for Grandoli.
“In this mural a child Lío appears lifting a trophy and symbolizes Messi’s journey, from Grandoli to the National Team. It represents the path and that passion that he sustained during these 15 years of trajectory”, said the artist from Córdoba.
While his colleague, Lisandro “Lichi” Urteaga, who together with the plastic artist Marlene Zuriaga made the largest Messi mural in Rosario, this time he was summoned by the residents of Grandoli to paint the El Campito club shield.
The neighborhood institution, which today occupies the corner of Lavalleja and Juan Manuel de Rosas, was a pasture where Lío and other boys from the neighborhood played classic chopped soccer.
The World Cup in Qatar is also throbbing in the massive and popular National Festival of Communities, where along with its traditional gastronomic, musical and cultural proposal; the fans and sympathizers of the national team have a special place with a playful proposal that makes them feel like protagonists.
It’s about the “World Experience: cheer, play, look and dress towards the World Cup”, that takes place in four stands within the premises of the Argentine community, with devices that use giant screens, the recreation of a playing field, a huge mural of Messi and Di María, and the possibility of making your own shirt to encourage the selection, seek to recreate the World Cup passion that is lived in the streets of the city.
In this way, the children, families and groups of friends who came to Parque a la Bandera this Tuesday afternoon from 7:00 p.m. became true fans with light blue and white makeup on their faces, hats and T-shirts to sing the harangues to “La Scaloneta”, in front of a huge LED screen and in front of video cameras that recorded the scenes that simulated a grandstand of the World Cup stadiums.
On the mini-field recreated with a goal, synthetic grass and the official ball of the competition, the most adept at the sport dressed as their favorite players and kicked or saved penalties and some even dared to imitate the most remembered plays from the World Cups .
To give the message of bond, friendship and solidarity that Ángel Di María and Lionel Messi represent, the artist Milena Kustto brought together the faces of the two idols of the Scaloni team in a mural where a space was created in which all visitors They posed for selfies.
For the end of the experience, all those who brought a t-shirt, a bag, a flag or some cloth object could choose among the many screen-printed prints with the best phrases to encourage the National Team in each game.
