From Jere Longman’s essential “Boy Genius” piece in the Sunday New York Times:
“No one plays with as much joy as Messi does,” Eduardo Galeano, the celebrated Uruguayan novelist and author of “Soccer in Sun and Shadow,” said in an e-mail. “He plays like a child enjoying the pasture, playing for the pleasure of playing, not the duty of winning.”
He plays like a child, and, away from the game, he still possesses a child’s reserve. Messi is seldom forthcoming. He even appeared distant last Sunday as Barcelona celebrated its latest Spanish league title with a belated festivity at Camp Nou. As confetti rained and his teammates danced and clapped and waved and threw peppers into the stands as a sign of strength, Messi mostly walked alone, his hands shoved into the pockets of his warm-up suit.
“Lio only wants to play,” said Thierry Henry, a French star and a former teammate of Messi’s at Barcelona who now plays for the Red Bulls of Major League Soccer.
On occasion, Messi does break his reticence. On Thursday, he said he played with the same eagerness that he did in Argentina when he improvised soccer balls from stones and women’s tights and cans of cola. “I have fun like a child in the street,” he said. “When the day comes when I’m not enjoying it, I will leave football.”