now the family's in quetta. he doesn't feel good there. hehe wants to meet messi. quetta is over the border, in pakistan, where more than two million afghan refugees live. murtaza's family resettled here because they were receiving threats from fundamentalists, among others, saying murtaza should be emulating a mullah instead of messi. it started with such promise. >> they id messisi would meet murtaza, b b it came to nothing. messi sent the ball and clothing, , but that reaeally me people angry and jealous of murtaza. we heard someone was planning to kidnap h him, so we fled. reporter: a short while ago, murtaza played football on a square like this with his afghan friends. they were obsessed with professional soccer in europe. they'd actually never seen any of the stars in person. then a visit from the greatest of all seemed to be right around the corner. >> we're totally disappointed because messi didn't come to afghanistan. i figure he was frightened. no wonder, with all the attacks. you can't blame him. reporter: it's not long ago that these pictures swept the