ISL 2022-23: Lionel Messi was different – FC Goa’s Marc Valiente recalls Argentina star’s youth days

FC Goa’s defender Marc Valiente has shared his experience of playing alongside Lionel Messi during his young days at Barcelona’s youth setup. Valiente revealed that Messi took some time to understand their game but he was able to hit the ground running after one season.

The defender revealed that Messi had a different kind of skill set and it was evident that he was a star in the making. Messi went on to make his debut for Barcelona in 2003 and had a glorious career at Blaugrana.

Valiente said as quoted by the official website of Hero ISL, “When he came to our team, I think he was 13-14. It was not easy for him because he came all the way from Argentina,” said Valiente. “He couldn’t play the first season. It was not easy for him to get used to our play, but after that, he was not shy anymore, and you could see from the first minute that he was so different.”

The Spanish footballer revealed that they were taught to play one or two-touch football but Messi will have six to eight touches on the ball at the same time.

“What I remember from that time was we used to play two touches – it was our style of game. We played one side to another as fast as we could, using one or two touches,” said Valiente.

“He touched the ball maybe six or eight times [in the same time] that we did two touches. It was something different that we never experienced. You could see that he was someone different. We never knew that he would become the best player ever but Leo, as a 14-year-old, was like that.”

Meanwhile, former India player Izumi Arata, who coaches Under-19 players at the Reliance Foundation Young Champs academy, revealed India has a huge pool of talent.

“Talent is everywhere. The pool is huge. You just need to make extra efforts to reach out to all parts of this country and I think Reliance Foundation is doing a fantastic job by keeping scouts in many cities and states to find the best talents from all over the country. We need much more academies with this kind of vision,” Arata said.