‘I’m happy. I have friends who are not’: What Inter Miami lost with Messi

“When the news happened, I had to turn off my phone,” said Mike Longin, member of the Green Lot Gang Inter Miami supporters group, of the moment Lionel Messi’s signing was confirmed.

“My friends, my family and even my pool guy were all shouting, ‘Hey, Messi is coming.’ We are so excited for you.” It was an exciting day. But from day one there was also: ‘Okay, what does this mean?’ We knew it wouldn’t be the same.”

Aside from increased interest in Inter Miami from people who previously cared little about the club – from pool boys to A-list celebrities – one of the biggest adjustments fans have had to make since Messi’s arrival is the relationship between the franchise and her supporters.

Prior to Messi’s signing, the team met on game days at the club’s training ground before walking the short distance to the DRV PNK Stadium. The players’ route was surrounded by barriers on either side, but fans were welcome – encouraged, even – to congregate along the railings, where they could high-five with their heroes, hunt for autographs or pose for selfies. The thronging hordes of new fans and journalists eager for a glimpse of Messi means ritual is no longer possible. Instead, after pre-match formalities, the team climbs aboard a chartered bus and is driven 150 meters to the stadium.

“What made Inter Miami special early on was that we had a great supporter group and the owners were very close to the fans,” Longin says. “My son threw an American football back and forth with it [co-owner] Jorge Mas. I had a beer with David Beckham. The club has done a lot to build up reach.

“It’s different now. It has gone from a family atmosphere to a professional atmosphere, which is what you would expect. We were a young club and we grew up overnight.”

The experience in the stadium has also changed. Inter Miami had the lowest average attendance in MLS before Messi. The number of gates at the DRV PNK Stadium has increased from 12,000 in 2022 to regular sold-out events at the 21,000-capacity arena. But according to some of the club’s hardcore supporters, a full stadium has not necessarily created a better atmosphere.

“[Messi’s arrival] has had a somewhat negative impact on the match experience as so many people are there just to see Messi; they don’t care about the rest of the team,” says Longin. “When he’s not playing and sitting in his box in the stands, people are jumping over chairs to see him.

“We knew things would change. But we weren’t prepared for how much it would change and how much different it would feel. Messi didn’t play our last home game, and it was quite nice to feel like this was the old stadium, this was the old tailgate. It felt a bit normal, and then Messi walked into his box and said, ‘Okay, Messi is here. This is the new normal. ”

It’s not just the fans who are getting used to the post-Messi world. The journalists who have covered Inter Miami since the club’s inception have also had to deal with a new reality.

“My life completely changed on June 7,” said Michelle Kaufman, a reporter for the Miami Herald who has covered football in the city since the 1990s.

“Before he came here, there were only a handful of us guarding the team. At most training sessions there were one to three of us. Four would have been a big crowd. Some days I was the only one with Phil Neville and the rest of the players. At a typical game there might be a dozen or fifteen of us in the press box. From the moment he arrived here, everything changed. They have metal detectors that we can walk through during training. For his first training session, there were 500 credential applications. I think 200 were awarded. A helicopter and a drone flew above us. It’s completely different from what it was before.”

The demand for media access was so great that the club had to reconfigure the press box at the DRV PNK Stadium. Chairs with armrests were removed and replaced with stools, increasing capacity from 38 to 54, and an additional press area was created elsewhere in the stand to accommodate any overflow. Previously, reporters could gather in the locker room after the game to talk to the players and staff. Due to the sheer number of journalists at games, this is no longer considered safe. The locker room has become a no-go area for the press.

“All of my most viewed stories in recent memory have been stories with Messi in the headline,” says Kaufman. “My workload increased, but my readership increased. The pressure increased. Competition increased. I didn’t used to have much competition on this beat. Now suddenly I’m competing with the entire Argentine media world and they are aligned with Messi and his inner circle.

“I have defeated many famous athletes in American sports and I have covered six World Cups and 14 Olympic Games. I’ve never seen anything like this Messi mania.”

For all the changes Messi’s move from Inter Miami has brought to the fan experience, the biggest impact supporters have felt has been the hit to their bank accounts. The club recently announced that season ticket prices will double for 2024.

“That surprised a lot of people,” says Longin. “It’s priced too high for a lot of people. That was a tough pill to swallow. People are very angry about it.”

“There is no longer a feeling that the supporters matter,” says Morgan Guigon, who podcasts as IMCF traveler. “It’s more of a feeling of ‘we’re going to make as much money as we can.’ I know I’m not the only one who feels this way. I speak to many different members of the fanbase and many of them feel the same way. Many people have had to cancel their season tickets because they cannot afford it.

“It was one of the happiest moments you could have as a fan when we signed Lionel Messi, but you didn’t think they would turn around and go back on everything they said in the four years the club existed, that the supporters and those who have been there from day one will come first and they have fully returned to that.”

On the pitch, Messi has undoubtedly brought joy to Inter Miami supporters who have followed the club through its tumultuous early years – from his dramatic goal debut in July to League Cup triumph in August and dreams of glory in MLS next year. But the eight-time Ballon d’Or winner’s presence has stirred complex feelings among the fanbase and strained what was once a family relationship with the club.

“I personally saw my team win our first trophy,” says Longin. “We are four years old and now we have a trophy. I’m very happy with where we are. I have friends who aren’t. They expected more. They expected him to play every game and destroy the league.

“The big hope is that Inter Miami gets a lot of fans out of this; that people come and stay for Messi. I don’t see much of it yet. A lot of it is pure Messi. When he left the field in his first game and the people left with him, I was heartbroken. It really bothered me. You still see that.”

“I bought it from day one,” says Guigon. “I’ve had season tickets since they went on sale. I was at the ceremony where David Beckham announced he was bringing a club to Miami.

“Since Messi came, it has been a completely different story. I’ve thought about just walking away and saying, ‘This isn’t it anymore.’