adidas Nemeziz Messi 17.1

The Adidas Nemeziz Messi 17.1 marked a pivotal moment in Lionel Messi's boot history: the end of his long-running dedicated "Messi" silo (Messi15/Messi16) and his move into Adidas's brand-new Nemeziz boot line, launched in May 2017 alongside the ACE and X silos as one of Adidas's core performance boot families. Designed for "agile attacking players," the Nemeziz was built around a completely new construction concept, the AgilityBandage wrap-around upper, inspired by the athletic taping rituals used in combat sports to support and lock down the foot. Messi headlined the launch of the new silo, becoming its most prominent face, and wore it (under his own personalized colorways with "MESSI" branding replacing the standard "NEMEZIZ" wording) throughout the 2017 and into the 2018 season, including the 2018 World Cup buildup.

The Nemeziz was unveiled by Adidas on May 26, 2017, with Messi confirmed to debut the boot on the pitch in the 2017 Copa del Rey final on May 27, 2017. The launch colorway across the line was "Dust Storm" (white/black/Solar Yellow), released commercially around that time at $225 USD retail for the standard 17.1. Over the following twelve months Messi received a succession of personalized signature colorways tied to Adidas's seasonal boot packs: "Ocean Storm" (debuted August 2017, worn in Argentina's World Cup qualifiers against Uruguay and Venezuela), "Pyro Storm" (October 2017, worn after Messi's return from Argentina World Cup qualifying duty), "Skystalker" (December 2017), "Cold Blooded" (debuted January 28, 2018, in Barcelona's La Liga match vs. Alavés, and worn into the Champions League tie against Chelsea in February 2018), and "Deadly Strike" (released March 29, 2018, for the remainder of the 2017/18 season). A laceless version, the Nemeziz 17+ 360Agility, was also released (e.g., in the Dust Storm colorway on June 29, 2017, priced at $320), but Messi consistently wore the traditional laced 17.1 rather than the laceless 360Agility variant.

The Nemeziz's headline innovation was the AgilityBandage system with TORSIONTAPES: an upper built from interwoven, elasticated strips that wrap around the foot and ankle, drawing design inspiration from medical/athletic taping used for injury support and lockdown, intended to give players a customized, second-skin fit that moves with quick changes of direction. This was paired with a Dual-Lock Collar around the ankle for additional lockdown and explosiveness, an AGILITYKNIT 2.0 interlocking yarn structure for a soft touch and lightweight adaptive feel, and a TORSIONFRAME outsole, an ultra-lightweight sole with TORSIONRIBS designed to support dynamic push-off during sprints and cuts. Adidas's NSG (Non-Stop Grip) technology was integrated into the stud/sole configuration, using mostly triangular studs engineered for players who make frequent, sharp directional changes. Sam Handy, VP of Design at Adidas Football, described the design philosophy at launch: "Part of our design philosophy is to look back to help us look forward," framing the AgilityBandage concept as rooted in the martial-arts taping tradition, and stating the aim was to give players the "tools to maximise their own creativity."

The launch "Dust Storm" colorway was a white, black, and hi-vis Solar Yellow combination. Messi's own signature editions typically diverged from the standard team colorways issued to other Adidas athletes, receiving unique treatments as a mark of his elite status: "Ocean Storm" (worn from August 2017) used blue, nautical-themed hues echoing Argentina's national colors, and was notably the first signature Nemeziz colorway Messi wore on pitch, in the laced 17.1 rather than the laceless model other athletes wore. "Pyro Storm" (October 2017) used a White/Solar Orange/Clear Grey combination, part of a broader "fire"-themed pack that spanned multiple Adidas silos. "Skystalker" (December 2017) featured bright Solar Red stripes over a patterned upper mixing Tactile Gold and black tones with a jet-black soleplate, and, notably, while the standard-issue Nemeziz Skystalker for other players used a darkened upper, Messi's version reverted to the eccentric striped design from the silo's original launch look. "Cold Blooded" (January 2018) used a Grey/Blue colorway, set apart from the "Triple Red" scheme other Nemeziz-sponsored athletes wore at the time. "Deadly Strike" (March 2018) used a "Unity Ink" and "Hi-Res Green" combination, drawing aesthetic cues from the contemporary Predator 18+ colorway family. Across all these editions, the AgilityBandage upper carried "MESSI" script in place of the standard "NEMEZIZ" wording, personalizing each pair.

The Nemeziz launch represented Adidas retiring the standalone "Messi" silo it had run since the Messi10 boots and folding Messi's signature presence into a new, broader performance concept aimed at explosive, unpredictable attacking players, with Messi as the line's headline ambassador rather than the boot being named directly for him (though his own colorways were still commonly referred to informally as "Nemeziz Messi"). Coverage from SoccerBible repeatedly frames Messi's exclusive, personalized colorways (differing from what other sponsored Adidas players wore in the same seasonal "packs") as a deliberate marker of his standing at the very top of Adidas's athlete roster; one SoccerBible piece on the Deadly Strike edition put it bluntly: "Because when you're better than everybody else you get stuff like this," while another described the Cold Blooded switch as "quite fitting for a player that simply doesn't conform to the standard levels of the game. He's different, and so is his next on-pitch Nemeziz 17 design." The AgilityBandage/taping concept itself was pitched by Adidas as inspired by "taping rituals used in martial arts for physical and mental strength," tying the boot's design language to ideas of resilience and readiness.

Messi debuted the Nemeziz silo in the 2017 Copa del Rey final on May 27, 2017 (Barcelona beat Alavés 3-1). He wore the "Ocean Storm" signature colorway during Argentina's 2018 World Cup qualifiers against Uruguay and Venezuela in late August/early September 2017, qualifiers that were part of Argentina's fraught, ultimately successful campaign to reach the 2018 World Cup. He wore "Cold Blooded" in Barcelona's La Liga match against Alavés on January 28, 2018, and continued in that colorway into the UEFA Champions League round-of-16 tie against Chelsea in February 2018. "Deadly Strike" carried him through the closing stretch of the 2017/18 domestic season. Specific individual goal tallies tied to each exact colorway were not independently verified in the sources consulted and are not stated here to avoid fabrication.

The boot that ended the standalone Messi silo and made him the face of adidas's new agility line, debuted in the 2017 Copa del Rey final and worn through six exclusive colorways in twelve months. The 17-generation split reviewers hard: the taping-inspired lockdown won fans, but plenty found the first laced version stiff and plasticky, and Soccer Cleats 101 noted Messi's own version got a softer forefoot and a carried-over soleplate the retail boot didn't. Today it's a cheap, plentiful resale pickup, and the Messi-branded colorways (Ocean Storm, Skystalker, Cold Blooded) are the ones worth hunting.