Chelsea midfielder Enzo Fernández has admitted he grew up as a huge fan of Lionel Messi and now draws inspiration from him as an Argentina teammate.
A World Cup winner and 2024 Copa America champion, Fernández, 25, has played alongside Messi in Argentina's squad since 2022.
"Leo is a role model both on and off the pitch," Fernández said.
"The way he conducts himself, the way he treats people, his teammates, and the way he pushes us in the dressing room. I feel privileged to be with him."
Messi, 38, scored his 116th international goal in Tuesday's 5-0 win over Zambia as Argentina continued their preparations for this summer's World Cup.
"His way of demanding the best is to win, to give your all, just as he did throughout his career," Fernández said of the Inter Miami captain.
"There's no way to explain everything he's achieved."
After the win over Zambia, Fernández remembered his teenage years, when he looked up to Messi.
"When I was first called up [to the national team], I asked [Messi] for a photo, just in case," the midfielder said.
"I used to watch him on TV and today I'm playing with him."
His admiration was such that at 15, Fernández wrote Messi a letter to encourage him to keep playing for the national team after Argentina's loss on penalties to Chile in the 2016 Copa America final.
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Messi and Argentina lost to Germany in extra time of the 2014 World Cup final in Brazil.
"I'd been watching Leo on TV since I was eight or nine," Fernández said.
"I saw how things weren't going his way and it was really heartbreaking.
"I seized the moment to write that. Then I stopped to think that I won a World Cup with him, and it's just crazy.
"We never talk about the letter, I don't know if he saw it."
