Football fans have been left stunned by Florian Wirtz after the Bayer Leverkusen and Germany star revealed who his footballing idol was.
Wirtz, 20, has been a key man for Xabi Alonso’s side this season as they look to end Bayern Munich’s monopoly on the Bundesliga, with the Bavarian giants having won the German league for 11 consecutive seasons.
The attacking midfielder made his debut for Leverkusen at the age of 17, becoming the club’s youngest ever player in the process, before he later became the youngest goalscorer in Bundesliga history.
Wirtz – who has 11 goals and 17 assists this season – is widely viewed as one of the hottest prospects in Europe and is expected to play a key role for Germany at Euro 2024 this summer.
And, in a succession videos compiled together from over the years, it has been revealed who Wirtz idol is.
In three separate clips, he names Barcelona and Portugal star Joao Felix as his idol, with Wirtz explaining his decision in one video.
He said: ‘He’s a similar type of player to me, he’s very creative and I learnt that from him.’
Felix has endured a difficult few years after initially breaking onto the scene at Benfica, with the 24-year-old struggling at Atletico Madrid since joining for £113million in 2019.
After falling out of favour with Diego Simeone, he has spent the past two seasons out on loan at Chelsea and Barcelona respectively, but hasn’t quite lived up to expectations.
Given Felix’s struggles, coupled with Wirtz’s exploits and undoubted potential, fans were left struggling to understand how the Portuguese attacker was his idol.
One said: ‘Bro is better than his idol,’ before another added: ‘Joao Felix should be learning from him.’
Others echoed these thoughts as one fan said: ‘How do you idolize worse players than yourself?’
Meanwhile, another confused fan quipped: ‘His idol aspires to be him one day,’ before one other added: ‘No way his idol is Joao Felix hahaha. The guy is already miles better than him.’
A further fan chimed in and mentioned the fact that Felix is not that much older than Wirtz.
They said: ‘They’re only four years apart lmao, man was idolizing a guy he’s better than and only a couple years younger than. Bro’s better than him.’
