Argentina football legend Lionel Messi has expressed regret over not learning English while growing up, saying he had the opportunity to study the language but failed to take advantage of it.

The Inter Miami forward spent more than two decades at Barcelona before moving to Paris Saint-Germain in 2021 and later joining the Major League Soccer side in 2023.

The 39-year-old admitted that learning English earlier in life would have helped him communicate more easily with people he has met throughout his illustrious career.

Messi, who has won eight Ballon d’Or awards and captained Argentina to victory at the 2022 FIFA World Cup, said his failure to learn the language remains one of his personal regrets.

“I regret many things. To not have learned English as a boy. I had the time to have at least studied English and I didn’t do it. I deeply regret it,” Messi said.

“I experienced situations where I was with incredible and spectacular personalities to be able to talk and have a chat and you feel half ignorant. “I always thought: ‘What an idiot, how I wasted my time.’

“When you’re young, you don’t realise it. Today that’s what I tell my children, having a good education, to study and be prepared.

“I always tell my children to take advantage of it. They have a different situation to the one I had although I never lacked anything…” (The Sun)