Foundation Leo Messi

FunIn 2007, Messi established the Leo Messi Foundation, a charity supporting access to education and health care for vulnerable children. In response to Messi's own childhood medical difficulties, the Leo Messi Foundation has offered Argentine children diagnosed with illnesses treatment in Spain and funds covering the transport, hospital and recuperation costs. Messi's foundation is supported by his own fundraising activity with additional assistance from Herbalife.

On 11 March 2010, Messi was announced as a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF. Messi's UNICEF ambassador activities are aimed at supporting children’s rights. Messi is supported in this by Barcelona, who also have a strong association with UNICEF.

He and Newell's have also ended a long public feud. Messi funded the construction of a dormitory inside Newell's stadium for the club's youth academy, as well as a new gymnasium for the club. For their part, Newell's has begun to embrace their ties with Messi, and plans to issue a special club membership card to Messi's son.

In March 2013, Lionel Messi donated €600,000 towards the refurbishment of a children's hospital in his hometown of Rosario, Argentina. The money was used to renovate the oncology unit at the Victor J Vilela Children's Hospital, as well as paying for doctors to travel to Barcelona for training.

In January 2015, Messi teamed up with tennis star Serena Williams as ambassadors in a new campaign, called 1 in 11 (represents the number of children worldwide who are unable to attend school), the result of a collaboration between UNICEF, the F.C. Barcelona Foundation, and Reach Out To Asia (ROTA). The campaign's aim is to help children around the world reach their potential through sport and education by raising funds for education programmes.

By the age of 21, Messi had received Ballon d'Or and FIFA World Player of the Year nominations. The following year, in 2009, he won his first Ballon d'Or and FIFA World Player of the Year awards. He followed this up by winning the inaugural FIFA Ballon d'Or in 2010, and then again in 2011 and 2012.

Messi is the first football player in history to win four FIFA/Ballons d'Or, all of which he won consecutively, and the first to win three European Golden Shoe awards.

In 2008, he won an Olympic Gold Medal with theArgentina Olympic football team.

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