A remarkable photo of Lionel Messi cradling a baby Lamine Yamal has resurfaced ahead of the 2026 World Cup final — taken 19 years ago at Camp Nou when Yamal’s family won a raffle to meet a Barcelona player.
Lionel Messi is poised to go head-to-head with Spain’s teenage prodigy in the World Cup final – 19 years after their first extraordinary meeting.
In 2007, the parents of Spain’s Lamine Yamal secured a competition prize to meet a Barcelona player when their son was merely five months old. That player turned out to be Messi, who was 20 at the time and already establishing himself as a rising talent for both Barcelona and Argentina – the same country that eliminated England in the 2026 World Cup semi-final.
Photographer Joan Monfort documented the encounter in a collection of memorable photographs. They resurfaced two years ago when Yamal played a key role in Spain’s Euro 2024 triumph, after his father posted one of the images online with the words “The beginning of two legends”.
In the photographs, a smiling Messi can be seen holding and bathing a tiny infant who would later trace such a strikingly similar path in his football career.
“It is a true miracle of destiny,” Monfort said. “It is serendipity – when you find something extra special, so much bigger than you ever thought. If you wrote this in a film it would not seem possible.”, reports the Mirror, reports the Irish Mirror.
The photoshoot took place in the away changing room at Barcelona’s Camp Nou stadium, with Yamal’s family having won a competition to be there. His parents – Moroccan-born Mounir Nasraoui and Sheila Ebana, originally from Equatorial Guinea – met after both moved to Barcelona as youngsters.
Yamal is their firstborn child, and shortly after his arrival, the couple entered a raffle organised by Catalan newspaper Sport in conjunction with Barcelona shirt sponsor and global children’s charity Unicef.
Those picked at random would have professional photographs taken of their newborn alongside a Barcelona first-team player. Yamal was among those chosen, and on the day the family turned up, they were paired with Messi entirely by chance.
“I had no idea it was Yamal in the photo until one my friends called me in 2024 and told me his father had posted it to Instagram,” Monfort recalled. “Messi is a really introverted guy, very timid and shy.
“He came into the dressing room and suddenly had to take these photos with a little baby – not even a kid, a proper baby and his face changed like he had no idea what to do! It is difficult for a young man, but Lamine was a very happy, smiley little baby.
“His mum Sheila helped us, she was a young girl and they were a very poor family, but they were very nice to work with.
“Messi was always a professional in these kinds of things and he adapted to the situation very quickly.”
At the time in 2007, Messi still sported the number 19 shirt for Barcelona, only taking on the iconic number 10 jersey a year later following Ronaldinho’s exit from the club. By the time he reached his 19th birthday, Messi had scored 11 career goals and secured La Liga and the Uefa Champions League once each.
Now having celebrated his 19th birthday on Monday, Yamal has already amassed a remarkable 56 goals, alongside three La Liga titles, one Copa del Rey and Euro 2024.
Yamal isn’t actually the player’s surname, but the second of his two given names. His full name is Lamine Yamal Naraoui Ebana, and he wears the first two on his shirt for both Barcelona and Spain as a mark of respect to two people who helped his family around the time of his birth.
Spanish media have widely reported that Yamal’s father vowed to name him after two friends who offered financial support to the family, allowing them to pay their bills during a spell of financial difficulty.
Lamine is a common male name in Arabic. It means honest or trustworthy in English.
Yamal is a variant of Jamal, meaning elegance or beauty.
He grew up in Rocafonda, a working-class neighbourhood in Mataro, 20 miles north of Barcelona. Yamal has celebrated some of his goals by forming a 3-0-4 sign with his fingers, a nod to Rocafonda’s postcode.
Speaking to El Pais earlier in the tournament, Yamal said: “What my mother has done, what my father has done, I couldn’t have done that for anyone who is not my child. If you don’t have money, it’s very hard to help your child play football.
“And my parents managed to make all that happen. It’s something I’ll never be able to repay them for.”
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