Maxwel Cornet, the Ligue 1 defender recently linked to The Whites, was picked out by Lionel Messi in 2015 as one of the Argentine's top ten up-and-coming young players.
Reports have suggested that Leeds are hopeful of landing the Lyon left-back this summer window - but are not willing to part with the £20 milllion sum the French side are supposedly asking for.
The Sun claim Marcelo Bielsa is a huge fan of the 24-year-old - an admiration he apparently shares with Barcelona icon Messi, who picked out Cornet as one of the most talented players to be rising through the ranks six years ago.
His 2015 'Backed By Messi' campaign with Adidas saw the Barcelona superstar provide his thoughts on which young players could eventually take his throne.
The then-19-year-old Cornet was among his selection, as was Chelsea’s Timo Werner and Atalanta’s Aleksei Miranchuk.
Last month, the Whites dropped 15 players from their wage bill, including club legend Gaetano Berardi, although most were youth-teamers, as they look towards the next Premier League campaign in the hope of landing new recruits and building upon their commendable ninth-place finish last season.
As for Cornet, the Ivory Coast international, who was once even on Pep Guardiola’s radar, has been with Lyon since 2015.
He was initially played further up the pitch in a more attacking role, with his best number of goals in a season being 12 in all competitions.
More recently he has been converted to a left-back, having predominantly played as a left or right-winger throughout his career.
