LeBron James hollered like he’d just won a fifth NBA championship ring. Serena Williams watched on in wide-eyed disbelief as if witnessing herself triumph in a record-equalling 24th Grand Slam singles final. Beneath Kim Kardashian’s trowel-applied make-up, the reality royalty was probably smiling the most rictus of grins.
The acrid phosphorus smell of pink and black pyro hung in the humid, heavy South Florida air around the trio’s pitchside seats. “Inter Miami golazo scored by numero diez,” trilled the stadium announcer, “Lionel…”
“MESSI!” exploded the exultant crowd, responding to the same call twice more with ever-increasing mania.
Inter Miami’s new No.10 was barely 45 minutes into a bow that had begun with a frenzied welcome from the substitutes’ bench. There had been goals disallowed for offside and Messi-created opportunities aplenty, but in the 95th minute, the shuffling Flea had just struck a free-kick of typical deft precision to secure a 2-1 win over Cruz Azul. A script writer would have been sacked for stretching the limits of credibility.
“As soon as I saw that the free-kick had been given, I thought, ‘This is the way we’re meant to win’,” said a visibly moved Miami co-owner David Beckham at full-time. “Tonight is about the people. It’s about this. This is what we always saw as our vision.”
After scoring 10 goals in just seven games, the Argentine’s genius delivered the Herons’ first trophy within a month, Miami beating Nashville on penalties in the Leagues Cup final. In 2024, they will play in the revamped Champions Cup – the CONCACAF Champions League – for the first time and commence the upcoming MLS season later this month as overwhelming favourites.
Sullen, quiet and moody in Paris, he looks happy for the first time in more than two years in his home from home. The reigning World Cup-winning captain is the new face of the league, bringing the sort of legitimacy, prestige and billions of eyeballs that not even Beckham at LA Galaxy from 2007 to 2012 could muster.
“This is our moment to change the football landscape in this country,” Cuban-American billionaire Jorge Mas, Miami co-owner with Beckham, declared at Messi’s July unveiling.
Arguably, Messi and Miami already have inside seven months, the former’s impact gargantuan by every metric going. But how? And what’s next for US soccer, especially when the world’s greatest player departs?
THE NEW CARLOS VALDERRAMA
For five years, Messi to Miami was little more than a dream. In early 2018, when Beckham invoked the clause in his original LA Galaxy contract allowing him to establish his own MLS franchise, one of the first people to get in touch was Messi. “Who knows,” quipped the Flea in a video message, “maybe in a few years you can give me a ring.”
Just over three years later, Beckham did just that. The duo have always been friendly, but when the latter was forced out of his beloved Barcelona for Paris Saint-Germain in the summer of 2021, Golden Balls and fellow co-owners Jorge and Jose Mas’ ambitious plan began in earnest.
“You’re talking about a year-and-a-half’s intensive talks to make this finally happen,” ESPN football correspondent Luis Miguel Echegaray, who has worked closely with Messi for years, explains to FFT. “Jorge Mas took the lead on conversations with Messi’s father, taking flights back and forth to Miami just trying to sell the project.”
Though Messi considered a Barça return, the constant stream of updates coming from the Blaugrana camp – “there were a lot of leaks,” Messi later explained – contrasted with Inter Miami, who continued to operate silently in the background.
“The Mas brothers and David Beckham were very patient, prudent and respectful towards the Messis,” Nelson Rodriguez, MLS executive vice-president of sport and competition, tells FFT. “The family were clear from the outset that they didn’t want public negotiations. The project and what it would mean, the lure of trying to be a transformational agent for the sport in a huge nation and up-and-coming league was part of it. And Miami is glamorous, a gateway city for South and Central America, and Europe too.”
Some 70 per cent of Florida’s second city is of Latin origin and one-third of the 300,000 Argentines to call the United States home live there. Messi, wife Antonela and sons Thiago, Mateo and Ciro were already regular holiday visitors to Miami. The city reminded them of their Rosario home and they owned a couple of properties in the area.
“Forget the money, the main component is the personal,” continues Echegaray. “Messi didn’t totally dismiss moving to Saudi Arabia – he’s already a tourism ambassador for the kingdom – and was seriously thinking about it, but the one person who said, ‘You can go to hell if you’re doing this’ was Antonela. To Leo there are only three things in the world: football, Antonela and his kids. After being unhappy in Paris, he wanted to have a good time and relax
