The footballer from Quibdo, Edwin Stiven Mosquera Palacios, met his idol Leonel Messi, considered the best current player in the world, and faced him in the match they played on July 25.
That day the teams Atlanta United (where Edwin Stiven plays) and Inter Miami (where Messi plays) played at the soccer stadium in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a match that Inter Miami won with Messi’s double.
At the end of the engagement, a photo went around social networks. Edwin was hugging his childhood idol, whom he watched on television in the El Poblado neighborhood when he was a child in Quibdó, who inspired him to play soccer, despite the fact that his parents did not want him to be a soccer player.
Edwin Stiven is only 22 years old and still dreams of playing in Europe, but says his greatest wish, which was to meet his childhood idol in person, has come true.
“I didn’t even know what to say to Messi, I just went up to him and asked for the photo, I told him how much I admired him and he was very attentive, he thanked me for my words and took all the time to greet me.”
In 2016 Mosquera Palacios had his first approach to professionalism when Independiente Medellín decided to take him to the club. The architect of that arrival was the coach Tucho Ortiz, who saw him in a tournament in Cali and took the risk to recommend him to Medellín, even for him to enter without taking any tests. His professional debut came on August 16, 2018 in a Copa Colombia match against Once Caldas at the Atanasio Girardot.
He began playing as a right back, but as he himself explains, seeing Messi made him want to play as a midfielder, as number 10, and for this reason he did everything possible so that his skill and talent were used in that area of the pitch.
And it is that they say that you play how you live and, in that sense, Edwin is cheerful, he paints his hair and likes to dance.
He was not in Medellín for long and went to play soccer in Brazil and Argentina. Before coming to MLS in the United States, he was part of Juventude, Aldosivi and Defensa y Justicia.
In Atlanta, North American football commentators describe him as a fast, skillful, very colorful and face-to-face player with his dribbling.