Football
Dermot Corrigan, Madrid correspondent 8y

Lionel Messi return from Barcelona is Newell's Old Boys president's 'dream'

Newell's Old Boys' new president Eduardo Bermudez says his dream is to tempt Lionel Messi to play for his hometown club.

Messi, 28, famously left his home city of Rosario to join Barcelona aged 13 as the Catalan club were prepared to pay for the $900-a-month hormone treatment he then needed to grow sufficiently to become a professional player.

The Argentina captain has regularly spoken about how he plans to return to his home country at some point, and has often suggested he could play for Rosario-based Newell's before finally hanging up his boots.

Bermudez told ESPN Radio in Argentina that over the course of his term of office at Newell's he hoped to be able to persuade Messi to play for his boyhood club, though his first priority was appointing a new coach.

"In these four years of my term, my dream is for Messi to return," he said.

"The first thing we have to do is bring order to the club. We will be working on that from tomorrow, when I will tell you who the coach will be."

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