Javier Pastore's Insight on World Cup and Enzo Fernández

Javier Pastore leans back, smiles, and watches another World Cup unfold from a different vantage point. No longer the elegant No. 10 threading passes in Albiceleste blue, “El Flaco” is now a guide, an agent, and a sharp observer of a tournament he once graced.

Two generations separate him from Lionel Messi, but their stories still intersect. They shared a dressing room with Argentina, crossed paths in Europe, and now Pastore finds himself representing one of the key men tasked with extending Messi’s international reign: Enzo Fernández.

We caught up with the former PSG and Elche midfielder at an AFA event in Miami, part of the federation’s push to plant its academies and identity around the globe. The World Cup, Enzo, Real Madrid, PSG’s power – Pastore moved through it all with the calm of someone who has seen football from every angle.

A World Cup that refuses to follow the script

From his seat in front of the television, Pastore sees a tournament that keeps surprising the established order.

“I’m watching a very competitive World Cup, with teams we weren’t expecting much from and that are putting up a fight,” he said. The underdogs have caught his eye, but the atmosphere has hooked him just as much. “I like seeing all the stadiums full; I’ve experienced all of Argentina’s matches, and I’m very happy with everything I’ve seen from the team.”

For a man who has lived the tension of World Cup nights from the pitch, there is a different kind of intensity now. Every Argentina game is experienced, not endured. The pressure has shifted from his shoulders to those of a new generation.

Spain, France… and the dream of another final

Pastore has always carried a strong bond with Spain, where he now lives, and Argentina, the country that made him. Asked whether a Spain–Argentina final is on his radar, he doesn’t hesitate.

“It would be a nice opponent,” he admitted. Then he sharpened the field. “I think France and Spain are the toughest opponents we could end up facing in a final, so let’s hope we can make it there, because that’s the most important thing.”

The message is clear: Argentina’s horizon is not just survival, not just a deep run. It is the final. Anything less feels short of the standard Messi’s era has set.

Enzo Fernández, the midfielder who never stands still

If Argentina are to get there, Enzo Fernández will be central to the effort. Literally and tactically.

Pastore, now his legal representative, has a front-row seat to his evolution and his World Cup form. “He is well, very positive, he is having a very good World Cup, in the first two matches he helped the team win comfortably,” he said.

The positional question follows Enzo everywhere: destroyer or creator? Pastore sees a player who has turned that debate into an advantage.

“Enzo has changed his position a great deal in recent years. He has played much deeper or as a midfielder getting into the box,” he explained. “Here with the national team he starts deep, but in the end he is the only midfielder who gets up to the attacking line and stays close to Messi. He is a player who adapts very well to any type of position.”

That image is striking: Enzo starting near the centre-backs, finishing attacks on Messi’s shoulder. It is the kind of tactical elasticity modern football demands – and the kind that inevitably draws attention from Europe’s biggest clubs.

Real Madrid whispers and a Chelsea exit on the horizon

Attention like that often has a postcode. In this case, Madrid.

“Do you see him at Real Madrid?” is a question that follows almost any elite midfielder under 25. Pastore doesn’t dodge it, but he refuses to let it overshadow the present.

“Today the player is calmly thinking about the national team, he is playing in a World Cup, he is very close to reaching the round of 16...” he said. That part is non-negotiable. “He is only thinking about that and we are looking at possibilities to leave Chelsea, but there is nothing firm or confirmed at any club.”

The door is open. Just not yet to anyone in particular.

The bond with Madrid, though, is real – even if it’s more personal than contractual for now. “He has many friends there, and he is very close friends with Julián Álvarez, and in the end, whenever they can spend time together, they are together there,” Pastore explained.

Then he added his own thread to the story. “And I also live in Madrid. Every time he traveled, he traveled to see me and to sort out work-related matters, but besides that: who doesn’t like Madrid? I never even played in Madrid... I even live there.”

A city that attracts players, a club that attracts stars, and a midfielder whose profile fits the stage. The speculation will not slow down once the World Cup ends.

PSG’s empire and Luis Enrique’s hunger

Mention Paris, and Pastore’s eyes still light up. He arrived at PSG in 2011, at the dawn of the Qatari era, and became one of the early faces of their revolution. Between 2011 and 2018, he watched the club transform into a European powerhouse.

Now, from the outside, he sees a project built to last.

“They have a squad to keep dominating, they are young, they have a lot of ambition to keep winning,” he said. The praise did not stop with the players. “A coach who has understood the players and the club perfectly at the moment it was in, he has won the Champions League two years in a row, he has truly done incredible things and I think he is going to continue along that path.”

For Pastore, Luis Enrique is the engine. “Luis Enrique is a coach with tremendous ambition and the club has made everything available to him to keep achieving great things.”

This is not the PSG of experiments and near-misses. In Pastore’s eyes, it is a machine built around a coach who knows exactly what he wants.

Would he play for this version of PSG, with its high pressing, relentless demands, and unforgiving expectations?

He laughed. “No, not even close,” came the answer.

A joke, yes, but also a nod to how far the club has travelled since he first walked into the Parc des Princes.

From Miami to Madrid, from Paris to the World Cup, Javier Pastore now lives in the spaces between eras – Messi’s twilight, Enzo’s rise, PSG’s sustained dominance. He has moved from creator to curator, from playmaker to power broker.

And as the World Cup tightens and the transfer market waits just beyond it, his phone – and his influence – will only get busier.