Former Lionel Messi teammate asks: “Where did that anger come from?”

Lionel Messi’s place in the pantheon of sporting greats was sealed, if it wasn’t already, with his triumph at the 2022 World Cup with Argentina. However it was at Barcelona that he rose to prominence as the world’s best and he will be forever adored by the club and its fans.

But while he led Barça to some of its greatest-ever triumphs, he was also known to be a very demanding figure. Former Barcelona teammate Marc-Andre Ter Stegen said as much on a recent podcast appearance, highlighting the highs and the lows of playing alongside an all-time great.

“It’s special to see him play soccer, he sees things that no one else sees,” Ter Stegen told German soccer podcast Phrasenmäher.

“He’s probably the only player who can kick a ball in your face if he wants to. He has that ability. Others would shoot somewhere else; he could hit the target. He’s done it several times,” the German revealed.

“Where did that anger come from? You’ll have to ask him,” Ter Stegen continued. “Messi gets motivation from a lot of things that we don’t get motivation from. We’ve had moments when things didn’t work out between us because he was annoyed with me and I was annoyed with him.”

Lionel Messi’s unique style

In 2018, 14 years on from his senior debut, Messi was named the captain of Barcelona. He is known to be a fairly reserved, private person away from the field but his talismanic talents saw him handed the armband for club and country.

Ter Stegen revealed that Messi’s quiet persona is only one side of him, with a real competitive steel undercutting his relaxed personality. That combination helped him rise to greatness and allowed him to drag teams to new heights but it could make him a difficult person to work with on a daily basis.

Ter Stegen explained: “We had our moments, and that’s fine. We were in the locker room together for a long time, and it was definitely interesting to have him on the team and see how he leads. Whether it’s my style or not, it was interesting to watch.”

“Leo is not a loudmouth; he works a lot with presence and needs to say relatively little, really. And when he says something, everyone listens. And that’s what you really want to achieve as a captain: to be listened to and followed.”

Despite the past frustrations, there is clearly a genuine affection that Ter Stegen feels for his former teammate. When he arrived from Germany as a 22-year-old he joined the all-conquering team of Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar, the team that would win a treble in 2014/15.

In total Ter Stegen would go on to win four LaLiga titles, five Copa del Rey and one Champions League during his time playing alongside Messi at Barcelona. Although he may not always have seen eye-to-eye with the Argentine, he’s in no doubt of Messi’s importance to those teams and to the history of the club.

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