MESSI MANIA

A fulsome tribute to the soccer superstar, with select career highlights.

In rapid montage style, sports presenter and writer Echegaray slips back and forth in time to trumpet Messi’s 2023 arrival in the U.S. and retrace his long, storied career from a first match at age five in his home city of Rosario, Argentina, until October, 2024, when he was playing for Inter Miami. The author slips in frequent asides on topics including Messi’s style of play, his charity work, appreciative comments from other soccer stars, and what it was like as a fan and journalist to interview him. The hero worship comes out as much in panegyrics on Messi’s character as in tallies of his on-pitch accomplishments. Along with repeatedly linking his subject to terms like humble and introvert, Echegaray holds him up as a role model: a hardworking immigrant who overcame a growth hormone deficiency in childhood and has made good with help from coaches and his devoted family. And lest any reader fail to draw proper lessons from his example, the author makes them explicit: “When you fail, that’s when you’re at your strongest because you have the chance to get up and try again. And that’s the true meaning of character.” Frequent on-field photos and flurries of specific match notes supply light doses of game action.

Tasty fare for readers inclined to hail the coming of soccer’s “Messi-ah.”