When CD Eldense’s outgoing president announced the club’s handover to Lionel Messi, she left him a request: look after it. The clubs Messi owns or is linked with now span different histories and communities. Carolina Holguín’s farewell, delivered on the Spanish club’s 105th anniversary, asked him to respect what Eldense means to its people. The incoming owner is inheriting a history that isn’t his own.
Messi hasn’t waited for retirement to begin this part of his football life. His Inter Miami contract runs through 2028, while his interests already extend to clubs in Spain and Uruguay and an esports organization. Some involve acquisitions. Others have grown through partnerships with people he knows from the dressing room.
Eldense’s announced handover follows a reported purchase agreement subject to approval from Spain’s National Sports Council. The club competes in Spain’s second division. It presents a different challenge from Messi’s earlier acquisition in Catalonia, where the emphasis was on developing talent further down the football pyramid.
In April 2026, UE Cornellà confirmed that Messi had bought the club, then playing in the fifth tier. Cornellà presented a long-term project built around local players and a stronger sporting institution. It brings him back into Catalan football as an owner, with responsibility for a club’s development rather than its next goal.
Messi described his ambition in a January 2026 interview with Luzu TV: “I want to have my own club, start from the bottom and make it big.”
The clubs Messi owns and his familiar partners
The connections through former teammates go back further than those Spanish acquisitions. Gerard Piqué acknowledged Messi’s participation in his FC Andorra project in 2019, alongside Cesc Fàbregas. Messi’s current stake, if any, isn’t publicly clear. The historical link to the Andorran club shouldn’t be mistaken for a newly announced purchase.
Sergio Agüero brought him into a different competitive world. Messi became a co-owner of KRÜ Esports in November 2023, joining the organization Agüero founded in 2020. Its teams have competed in games including Valorant and Rocket League. Here, the familiar football partnership leads to an esports business, not another club in the football pyramid.
In Uruguay, Messi joined Suárez at Deportivo LSM in May 2025. The existing Deportivo LS became Deportivo LSM, adding Messi’s initial to the name. Suárez’s underlying sporting project in Ciudad de la Costa dated to 2018, so Messi was joining something his friend had already spent years developing.
The pair introduced their partnership together on video. Suárez emphasized opportunities for children and adolescents, while Messi thanked him for the invitation to help the project grow. They also announced plans to enter competitions organized by Uruguay’s football association.
There’s a family connection in Argentina, too. Leones de Rosario was founded in Alvear in 2015, and the Asociación Rosarina de Fútbol lists Lionel’s brother Matías Messi as its president. Other Messi family members appear in its leadership. It’s a family-run club, although the association’s profile doesn’t specify a personal investment by Lionel.
Inter Miami offers a potential route from club captain to part-owner. Messi’s contract reportedly includes a future minority ownership stake, an arrangement distinct from an already activated holding. The club where he’s still playing therefore belongs in a different category from Cornellà, which has explicitly announced him as its owner.
There’s no single ownership model connecting the clubs Messi owns and the teams tied to his name. Messi has bought a club, joined projects created by friends and become associated with another through his family. Those differences disappear when every badge is placed beneath the same ownership label. A partnership, a takeover and a future stake each come with different responsibilities.
At Eldense, the immediate football task is considerably more specific. New coach Javi Calleja has identified staying in the second division and establishing the team there as the club’s first objective. Before any grand expansion, there are points to earn and a place in the division to protect. That’s where Messi’s ambition to build meets the work of running a club.
