adidas X Speedflow Messi "El Retorno"

The Adidas X Speedflow Messi "El Retorno" ("The Return") is a limited-edition signature boot released in June 2021, marking Lionel Messi's return to Adidas's flagship speed silo — the X line — after roughly five years away wearing the Nemeziz franchise (and, briefly before that, the Messi16/Messi15 lines). It was the inaugural Messi colorway on the brand-new X Speedflow platform, succeeding the X Ghosted, and it doubled as a 15-year anniversary tribute to Messi's partnership with Adidas, which began in 2006. The design deliberately looked backward — to his first-ever Adidas boots, the F30 TUNiT, and to one of the most replayed goals of his career — making it one of the most narratively rich releases of his signature boot history.

• Officially launched on June 4, 2021.
• Messi debuted the boots in competitive play at the Copa América 2021 tournament, which began on June 13, 2021.
• The boots remained his active match boot through the tournament, which ran into July 2021 (the final was played July 10, 2021), placing its primary window of relevance at June–July 2021.

"El Retorno" launched as the debut colorway of the all-new X Speedflow silhouette, the successor to the X Ghosted line within Adidas's speed-focused boot family. Key construction features include a Primeknit textile collar for a snug, sock-like ankle wrap, a 3D-molded heel counter for lockdown, a laser-cut TPU cage bonded to the upper for support and touch, and a traditional lace closure — notable given Messi's consistent preference for laced boots even as Adidas pushed laceless "+" designs elsewhere in its range. The boot also featured a metallic-finish sole plate as part of its aesthetic package.

The colorway is described as Tech Metallic/Core Black with Intense Orange accents, built around a gold-toned metallic base with black detailing and vivid orange highlights. Personalization details are dense: a "MESSI + 10" logo appears on the tongue and medial side, "MESSI 10" and his signature appear on the left heel, "LEO 19" (a reference to his birth date, June 24, 19-87) and his signature appear on the right heel, and the Argentina flag is printed on the sockliner. Most significantly, the boot carries direct heritage callouts — a "+F30" logo in Intense Orange on the right boot's Three Stripes (referencing his first-ever Adidas boot, the F30 TUNiT) and a "+F50" logo on the left boot's Three Stripes (referencing the F50 adiZero line he wore during his rise to superstardom) — alongside a reinterpreted "Teamgeist" logo on the tongue.

"El Retorno" ("The Return") carries a double meaning: it marks Messi's literal return to the X speed silo after roughly five years wearing Nemeziz-family boots, and it commemorates 15 years since Messi first signed with Adidas in 2006 as a teenager, when his first boot was the F30 TUNiT rather than the flagship F50. The colorway and heritage logos were built to trace that journey — from his earliest F30 days through the F50 adiZero era — culminating in the new X Speedflow generation. Central to the boot's narrative is its connection to Messi's iconic solo goal for Barcelona against Getafe in the Copa del Rey, scored on April 18, 2007, in which he dribbled from inside his own half, beat several defenders, and finished past the goalkeeper — a goal immediately and widely compared to Diego Maradona's "Goal of the Century" against England at the 1986 World Cup, both for its solo, coast-to-coast nature and for the way it echoed Maradona's iconic celebration and run. By referencing the F30 boots he wore for that goal directly on "El Retorno," Adidas tied the new X Speedflow signature line explicitly back to that Maradona-echoing moment as the symbolic origin point of Messi's Adidas legacy.

Messi debuted "El Retorno" at the 2021 Copa América, hosted in Brazil, where Argentina went on to win the tournament — Messi's first major title with the senior national team after a career of near-misses and final defeats. He was named the tournament's best player and finished as its top scorer (Golden Boot), with Argentina defeating host nation Brazil 1–0 in the final on July 10, 2021, at the Maracanã. This breakthrough international triumph, achieved while wearing "El Retorno," is widely regarded as one of the most emotionally significant moments of Messi's career, finally delivering him a major trophy with Argentina.