The following is an excerpt from The Messi Effect: How the Global Legend Changed the Future of American Soccer by Paul Tenorio, St. Martin’s Press. (Publication date: June 2. Available for preorder.)
On day one, the players held their breath to see how Lionel Messi might assert himself around the group. He did not yet have his visa, so he couldn’t train, but as the team gathered in the gym before taking the training field, Messi said a few brief words before deferring to the captains.
“He didn’t want to come in and make it seem like he was the center of attention,” said Kamal Miller, the Canadian center back who joined the team a few months prior. “He gave respect to the captains at the time and didn’t want to come and seem like he was completely taking over. So right away, we respected that a lot and appreciated that.”
Over the next two days, Victor Ulloa tried to normalize the idea that he could turn his head and talk to Messi. Quickly, the two found commonalities in fatherhood. They talked about their kids. Ulloa heard stories about Messi’s humility, but now he was experiencing it in person. He recognized how Messi was trying to integrate himself into the locker room. The superstar was approachable and happy to chat with new teammates.
“We didn’t know if he was going to come in and try to change our ways and the culture that we had within the locker room,” Ulloa said. “But to be honest, he tried to fit in. We would go and ask him certain things, what he wanted to do, but he was like, ‘No, no, what do you guys do?’ Then he would be like, ‘Yeah, let’s do that.’ We never saw a side of him that he was like, ‘Oh, nope, we’re doing this because I say so.’ It was the complete opposite. And that was surprising.”
Messi was trying to accomplish the impossible: act like everything was normal. He arrived without an entourage. A personal bodyguard, Yassine Cheuko, was there, as was his father, Jorge Messi, on occasion. But in those first days, the retinue was more limited. Messi was accessible to just about everyone on the team.
Accessibility, though, comes with some degree of awkwardness, and Ulloa soon realized he had a dilemma.
As one of Inter Miami’s veterans, Ulloa had the privilege of being the administrator of the team’s WhatsApp group chat, which meant controlling its membership. When new players joined the roster, Ulloa invited them to the group. When they left, he removed them. It was an unremarkable responsibility until he walked into the locker room on that Wednesday morning. Now, Ulloa realized that he probably had to at least offer Inter Miami’s new star player entry into the chat. Considering Messi’s eagerness to blend quickly into the group, Ulloa figured he would at least want to know about the text chain.
But how exactly do you ask Messi to join the WhatsApp group? Asking for Messi’s number so early felt forward, but Ulloa decided he just had to go for it.
“Hey man, we have a WhatsApp group with the guys. I don’t know if you want to be a part of it or not, but I just wanted to let you know,” Ulloa said to his locker mate.
“Absolutely,” Messi replied quickly. “Here, take my number.”
Ulloa entered Messi’s number into his phone and then added him to the team chain without a mention to the rest of the group.
Just like everything else changing around the club, this was, somehow, the new normal.
A new normal was exactly what Messi was seeking. For many foreign stars who arrived in MLS, life at the top of the sport in Europe had been restrictive. Footballers are under a microscope. Every action on the field is analyzed, every word in an interview dissected. The spotlight follows them to their lives away from the field, too. They often find it difficult to do essential day-to-day things like grocery shopping, eating in restaurants, or catching a movie. …
… Messi may have been chasing normalcy, but his teammates were hurtling in the opposite direction.
The absurdity of their new reality was hammered home when forward Leonardo Campana innocently dropped a question into the Inter Miami team WhatsApp group chat ahead of the Sunday event at which Messi would be unveiled to fans.
“Hey,” the Ecuadorian forward wrote. “Does anybody have any extra tickets?”
Few realized that the number Ulloa added a couple of days earlier was Messi’s, so it was a shock when their new teammate replied, asking Campana how many tickets he needed.
“Just from there, I was like, ‘Whoa.’ They’ve known each other two days, three days,” said Inter Miami defender DeAndre Yedlin, a U.S. national team veteran. “Just to show that generosity, that’s a great first example of how he is.”
Messi’s new teammates all rushed to save his number. Some came up with pseudonyms for their famous colleague, the better to keep it safe should they ever be hacked or lose their phone.
And, yes, Campana got those extra tickets for “The Unveil,” where Messi would be introduced as an Inter Miami player to a sold-out DRV PNK Stadium.
• From: The Messi Effect, By Paul Tenorio. Copyright © 2026 by the author, and reprinted with permission of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
• The Messi Effect: How the Global Legend Changed the Future of American Soccer By Paul Tenorio (St. Martin’s Press). Publication date: June 2. Available for preorder.
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