Lionel Messi had two Real Salt Lake defenders on either side of him, two more a few yards in front of him. He tapped the ball quickly with his left foot away from them all, to a place where only teammate Robert Taylor could reach.
Moments later, Inter Miami scored the first goal of the Major League Soccer season.
Taylor’s goal in the 39th minute set the tone, Diego Gómez added an insurance score in the 83rd minute and Inter Miami – kicking off Messi’s first full season with the club – opened the 29th season of MLS with a 2-0 win over Real Salt Lake on Wednesday night.
Messi was in mid-season form, shooting through and around defenders and almost giving the sell-out crowd what they wanted to see by almost scoring after a free-kick and then a corner midway through the first half.
“I think the eyes of the world are on Inter Miami, and I hope they can deliver on that, and whatever expectations people have,” said MLS commissioner Don Garber, who was at Wednesday’s match. “I especially want his experience to be good, that the team’s experience is successful and that they are positioned both here in the league and around the world. That’s the story that I think is most important to us.”
Messi scored 11 goals in 14 games for Inter Miami last season, leading the team to the Leagues Cup championship – their first-ever trophy – shortly after he stunned much of the football world by signing a two-and-a-half-year contract. contract worth approximately $150 million. He played just six MLS games in 2023 and scored once. Injuries slowed him down late in the 2023 season and Inter Miami, which was well outside the postseason picture when Messi joined last summer, did not make the MLS playoffs.
But the craze around him does not disappear. The lines for fans to buy his jersey, which was the MLS bestseller last year and has a new sponsor design this year, were outside the door of the team store. He had the assist for the first goal and set up Luis Suarez – one of his former Barcelona teammates – with the pass that Suarez converted into the assist on Gómez’s goal.
They certainly looked like a contender. That was not the case in the exhibition season.
Inter Miami started their season with an international preseason tour with seven matches in five different countries – totaling around 40,000 kilometers of travel, eight goals in total, multiple apologies to fans who wanted refunds after Messi missed a match in Hong Kong due to a injury. and only one win.
Inter Miami enters the season as the favorites to win just about everything. Messi’s team is listed as the 5-2 favorite to win the MLS Cup, while Messi and Suarez are the top two choices to win the Golden Boot, which is awarded to the competition’s top scorer.
The club is in fact a favorite to win the Supporters’ Shield as the top club in the MLS regular season. And if someone were to bet $200 on Inter Miami now making the Eastern Conference playoffs, that bettor could make exactly $1 in profit if Messi’s club makes the field – meaning it’s considered an absolute postseason lock.
after newsletter promotion
It should be noted that the club has not yet won a play-off match. Inter Miami has been to the playoffs twice and was eliminated straight away, both times 3-0.
But Messi moves the needle – every needle – so much. He turns 37 in June and the eight-time Ballon d’Or winner continues to turn heads, both on and off the pitch, like almost no one else in the sport. Apple TV released the first episode of Messi’s World Cup: The Rise of a Legend on Wednesday, and the streaming service (which has a 10-year deal worth at least $2.5 billion with MLS) was part of the group that Messi threw during his trial. to decide last year whether to join the league.
Apple hasn’t released any numbers, but senior vice president Eddy Cue said Wednesday he was “shocked” by how successful Messi’s Year 1 in MLS was.
“We had a great first season,” Cue said. “The number of viewers was much greater than we ever expected. The amount of time people spent watching games is more than any sport I’ve seen.
Messi mania continues. And year 2 has win #1.