Last update 22 September, 2026 by football hung
Being Messi's successor seems like the best compliment a teenage footballer can receive.. Until the first bad game comes. So, the same boy who was presented as an unrepeatable apparition begins to hear that it was not that big of a deal. Between both sentences, sometimes, He has barely had time to learn to play against adults.
Football is in a tremendous hurry to give a known last name to a new talent. A left-handed person who drives with his foot glued, a Barça youth player who breaks a record, a dribble in a youth tournament: We already have another Messi. The comparison serves to draw attention, but it also sets an enormous expectation. The kid is beginning to be valued by the distance that separates him from a legend.
How to make a Messi successor
The tag allows you to sell a story in two words. Explain what a playmaker does well, what needs to be improved and in what context it performs requires observing it. Calling him "the new Messi" saves all that work. The reader recognizes the name, The video finds spectacular promise and the conversation already has a protagonist.
Then a peculiar competition begins: who discovered it first. A good match becomes the definitive test; three goals in youth, in a preview of what he will do in the Champions League. In that enthusiasm media are mixed, aficionados, representatives and the clubs' own need to generate enthusiasm. There is no need for an organized campaign for everyone to end up amplifying the same comparison.
The problem comes when hyperbole becomes an evaluation criterion. Earn a position, adapting to another city or completing a good season no longer seem like sufficient achievements. The supposed heir is asked to confirm a prophecy that others wrote for him.
Bojan Krkic: a career that deserves to tell itself
Bojan offers a good example of that crooked look. He Barcelona remembered when announcing its withdrawal who disputed 163 games and scored 41 goals with the first team. Then he played, among other clubs, in Rome, Milan, Ajax and Stoke. He retired in 2023 con 32 years and 14 titles as professional.
These are figures and experiences that many footballers would sign.. However, His name continues to appear associated with the promise of what supposedly should have been. Bojan explained to the BBC that the comparison with Messi required him to be exceptional even after leaving Barça.
There's the catch. If the starting point is to look like the best, a remarkable career can end up being narrated as a disappointment. Recognizing that Bojan did not reach the level that some imagined is compatible with valuing what he did do.. The prediction of a cover should not become a footballer's debt.
Gai Assulin: when the nickname is remembered more than the player
Gai Assulin also made the comparison. He was trained in the Barça quarry, He made his debut with the first team in the Copa del Rey and went through Manchester City without establishing himself. Later he played for Spanish clubs such as Racing de Santander., Hercules and Sabadell. His journey was far from the expectations that had accompanied his first steps.
His case appears in our article on players who went to stars and ended estrellados. When returning to these stories it is worth adding a question: How much of the disappointment belongs to the actual performance and how much to the expectation that had been built?
A trajectory can fall short of expectations for many reasons.. The opportunities, sports decisions, injuries or fit into a team deserve to be analyzed separately. Attributing everything to pressure would be as simplistic as saying that the player lacked character.. A nickname does not explain a career.
Alen Halilović already asked not to be called Messi
There are times when the adolescent is more cautious than those who talk about him. In one profile of UEFA that recovered its statements of 2012, Alen Halilović already asked to avoid comparison. I admired Leo, but he considered himself very far from him and focused his objective on playing well and earning the coach's trust..
Had 16 years and had just aroused enormous expectations at Dinamo Zagreb. In 2014, Barcelona announced his incorporation with 17 years and a first assignment in the subsidiary. The sports project contemplated learning; the public story was already looking for a star.
That difference matters. A promise needs room to discover what footballer he can become. If each assignment, substitution or change of team is interpreted as an examination of whether he is the new Messi, any intermediate step seems like a step backwards. Sometimes, the player himself is clearer about his next objective than those who assign him the final destination.
Ansu Fati and the weight of inheriting the ten
With Ansu Fati, The succession also had a concrete image. He 1 September 2021, he Barça announced that it would wear number ten after Messi's departure. Had 18 years and the statement itself recalled that he was still recovering from an injury.
Giving him that number could be understood as a sign of trust. It also made it inevitable that each photograph would refer to the previous owner.. In the same shirt, the enthusiasm for a young man with his own personality and the memory of everything that Messi had meant coexisted..
The number does not explain his physical problems or the development of his career.. Yes, it serves to observe how a symbolic succession is constructed.. Inheriting a number is a fact; inheriting the performance of the person who wore it for years is an expectation. Confusing both things turns a gesture of support into a demand that no one can guarantee..
Responsibility also lies in how we tell football
Of course you can get excited about a youth. Football would lose a lot if it were forbidden to get excited. But between saying that a boy has an extraordinary talent and crediting him with Messi's career, there is an enormous difference.. The first statement describes what we are seeing. The second aims to know the next fifteen years.
It is also a good idea to remember who put the label on when it comes time to remove it.. Too many times the footballer appears responsible for having broken a promise he never made.. Whoever compared it to a legend moves on to the next name; the player keeps the sign of disappointment.
Bojan, Assulin, Halilović and Ansu have different trajectories. Putting them together here does not mean equalizing their achievements or attributing the same outcome to them.. What they share in this story is the ease with which football converts a similarity, a hope or a backbone in an obligation.
The next time a possible Messi successor appears, maybe it's worth starting by learning his name. After, observe it, enjoy it and let it complete its own story. It is difficult enough to get to professional football without having to do it answering for someone else's career..
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
