Sport: Messi Wants To Meet Boy Who Made Shirt From Bag

The Afghanistan Football Federation said Messi was keen to meet Murtaza

Lionel Messi wants to meet a young boy who went viral after a picture emerged of him wearing a homemade shirt fashioned from a plastic bag in homage to his idol.

Five-year-old Murtaza Ahmadi worships the Argentinean football star, but a jersey of the Barcelona player is beyond the means of his poor family in Afghanistan's Ghazni province.

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His older brother Homayoun, 15, made him the blue and white striped plastic "shirt" with Messi's name written in marker pen and posted a photo of Murtaza wearing it on Facebook.

Jorge Messi, Lionel's father, told the AFP news agency that the footballer was aware of the photos and "wants to do something" for the boy.

Messi in action for Barcelona at the weekend

The Afghanistan Football Federation (AFF) also said Messi was keen to meet Murtaza as soon as possible, but nothing is set in stone.

"Messi has been in communication with the federation to set up a meeting with the young boy," AFF spokesman Sayed Ali Kazemi told AFP.

"We are working to see whether Messi will come to Afghanistan or the five-year-old will travel to Spain or they will meet in a third country."

There was no immediate comment from FC Barcelona.

Setting up a meeting in Afghanistan, which is in the midst of a Taliban insurgency, would be fraught with security challenges.

The Spanish embassy in Kabul told AFP it would do all it could to facilitate a meeting somewhere in Europe.

Murtaza's father, a poor farmer in the district of Jaghori, said he could not afford to buy a replica shirt, adding that his son only had a punctured ball to play with.

The photo of Murtaza touched a chord with football fans around the world.

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Sport was rarely played under the rule of the Taliban, and the football stadium in the capital Kabul became known as the venue for executions, stonings and mutilations.