Lionel Messi was curious about the boy they called the New Messi. The then 16-year-old Rodrigo Mora, then of Porto and now Roma’s treasured jewel. The resemblances were striking. Like Messi in his wunderkind years, soft curls of the puffy mullet bounced onto forehead, he was of similar physical dimensions, of stocky build and a subterranean centre of gravity. The Portuguese did Messi things too, cutting into the box with explosive speed from a leisurely stroll, and twinkling and jinking past his markers with teenage intrepidness.
Messi, during Inter Miami’s fixture with Porto last year, was so pleased with what he saw that he took him by his side, swapped shirts, and later put him among the top ten young stars. Rodrigo couldn’t contain his hysteria and blurted out a verbal faux pas that incensed his country. “As a Portuguese, I could not hold back the jealousy in my heart. If only we had a figure like Messi,” he said. Cristiano Ronaldo’s faithful spewed scathing vitriol at him regardless.