Borussia Dortmund's Jadon Sancho Says Ronaldinho Was His 'Role Model' Growing Up

Borussia Dortmund starlet Jadon Sancho has revealed his admiration for former Barcelona and Brazil star Ronaldinho. 

The 18-year-old will face Tottenham Hotspur in the UEFA Champions League round of 16 on Wednesday in his first club game at Wembley Stadium, though he has played there before as an England international.

Per Goal's David Binder, Sancho spoke ahead of the clash and said: "I've always wanted to be a professional footballer, make people watch me and say 'whoa,' like how I used to watch Ronaldinho and go 'wow, I want to be like him one day.' Hopefully, I could become that level one day and players will look up to me and say 'wow.'"

On his desire to emulate Ronaldinho, he added: "My role model was Ronaldinho. The reason behind that is how he just beat people with ease and did things that no one else was doing at his time. That's why it was him."

Another role model for the youngster has been team-mate Marco Reus, as he discussed with Raphael Honigstein for BT Sport:

Per Binder, he elaborated on his relationship with the Germany star:

"Reus, his case is that he's helped me mature as a player, he can tell when I'm having my game and I'm not.

"You can see, when he talked to me after I scored against Frankfurt, he was saying 'Relax, be yourself, you have nothing to lose, you're playing well so far.'

"Frankfurt was a big game and I was a bit nervous and you could tell I was a bit off it but eventually I got into the game."

Sancho has established himself as a regular fixture in the team this campaign with 17 starts in all competitions.

The winger—who predominantly plays on the right but has also spent time on the left this season—has rewarded the faith of manager Lucien Favre with an impressive return of eight goals and 13 assists.

He got one of each in Dortmund's 3-3 draw with Hoffenheim on Saturday:

As he demonstrated in that match, he's a dazzling player with the ball at his feet.

Blessed with technical skill and blistering pace to go with it, defenders have had a difficult time stopping him this season:

That he is already showing plenty of end product only makes him more exciting, and he'll be eager to show what he can do on home soil on Wednesday in what is arguably the biggest game of his career.

It could be a close tie between Spurs and the Bundesliga leaders, so it could fall to players such as Sancho to make the difference for their side.