Leo Barnes: The young YouTube footballer with millions of fans

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Updated / Monday, 22 Jun 2026 10:03 It's the World Cup for content creators too, and one of the best around is a 14-year-old YouTube star from Belfast named Leo Barnes who has over 3 millions subscribers! The content creator joined fellow social media star DavidMC and Aisling O'Reilly in the Total Football to tell us how he started his channel in 2023 when he was only 11.

Leo says: "I've always preferred playing it than watching it, but I wanted to go out and copy the footballer skills that I was seeing on TV." DavidMC and Leo Barnes talk YouTube on Total Football. I've always thought I could do that, and I could be one of the kids in the videos.

"So, I just started making my own videos and started copying the people I was seeing on TV, and I really loved it from the start, and I still do." On top of all this, he somehow has time for a weekly football podcast with Braydon Bent. Stream all episodes of Total Football, presented by Aisling O'Reilly and DavidMC, on RTÉ Player here!