The day after a 3-0 loss at St. Louis City on Saturday, which dropped Inter Miami to the bottom of Major League Soccer, the club will celebrate the acquisition of Lionel Messi on Sunday.
Hours before their game in Missouri began, Miami announced that Messi would be traveling there, but that didn’t help Gerardo Martino’s squad win; they suffered their 14th loss in 22 games.
Miami is now in last place in the Eastern Conference and last out of 29 teams after their most recent defeat.
Messi, a seven-time Ballon d’Or winner and World Cup hero for Argentina, now represents the MLS’s weakest team.
Fortunately for the team and their new hero, MLS does not have relegation like the majority of leagues in the globe. But if the team is to make a run in the playoffs, Messi will need to have a seismic impact on the field.
In the new Leagues Cup, a competition that brings together all the top-tier teams from Major League Soccer and Liga MX in Mexico, Messi was anticipated to make his debut on Friday against Cruz Azul.
The 36-year-old former Barcelona great won’t have a chance to start assisting Miami up the league table until they meet Charlotte on August 20 since MLS is stopping play for a month while the Leagues Cup is contested.
The Florida club obviously hopes that Messi will be able to improve the performance of his colleagues despite the fact that the move has delighted supporters and given Miami and MLS an opportunity to increase their popularity and money.
“Lionel Messi is an incomparable talent. What he brings on and off the field will elevate everyone around him and we’re excited to have him at Inter Miami,” the club’s Sporting Director Chris Henderson said on Saturday.
Miami’s performance in St. Louis was uninteresting, as the local team took the lead in the 28th minute on a header from a corner that was misdirected by Samuel Adeniran.
Five minutes before halftime, St. Louis, who are now atop the Western Conference standings in their first season, made it 2-0 when Miami once more failed to defend a corner and Tim Parker headed in a goal at the near post.
Ten minutes from the end, German Eduard Loewen delivered a crushing free kick to put an end to Miami’s misery.
