Lionel Messi brings Hollywood to Miami | Football News

For all the captivating performances he has put on screen for the world audience, Leonardo DiCaprio was never going to be the lead protagon last Sunday. There was a stunning l of glitterati present, but none to watch him. His six Academy award nominations and a much-awaited upcoming Martin Scorsese flick garnered little interest in the Hollywood town that eve. And so, with an ice cream bar to digest it all, DiCaprio took his seat at the Dignity Health Sports Park to watch what the fuss was all about this namesake of his.Selena Gomez was there as well, in a perennial state of shock with her eyes and face wide open. So was Owen Wilson, who was ‘as excited as a kid on Chrmas’, with his kids to accompany. Will Ferrell has admitted to screaming at his oldest son during his school footie games, but despite the club he co-owned losing 3-1, he stayed composed in the VIP box. Perhaps mesmerized, like the rest of Los Angeles’ finest. Or Messi-merized, if there is such a thing.In the first act of his career at Barcelona, the Spanish dictionary had added the word ‘inmessionante’ in his honor; used to describe ‘the perfect way to play football’. In what is seemingly Messi’s final act as a footballer, maybe the Americans can do their bit adding a word that best describes the perfect way to enjoy football.

What a night in LA 🤩 pic.twitter.com/wkwcoIvuDX
— Major League Soccer (@MLS) September 4, 2023
Since his arrival to Inter Miami this July, Messi’s 11 goals in 11 games and the MLS club following an 11-game winless streak with an 11-game unbeaten run establishes a point. About his impact on the pitch. But let’s talk about something far less quantifiable. Former England forward turned pundit Ian Wright touches upon it in his podcast. “It’s the joy, the pure joy. It’s almost like I’m waiting every morning now for a Messi clip. Because the joy that this man brings at this stage of his career,” Wright says.
The mood have been on the up since the opening night—Messi’s debut for Inter Miami in July. Imagine this. You arrive at a new club, a new league, a new continent and your first big act for the club is a stoppage-time free kick goal. Hollywood scripts don’t come out this good these days. It was David-Beckham-in-tears good. The Inter Miami co-owner had conceded to having told his business partner 10 years ago, “One day, we need Messi to come to our club.” Maybe it was the manifestation coming true that made him tear a little. Or perhaps, it was just getting to watch the new Inter Miami number 10 do his thing.

MESSI’S FIRST GOAL FOR INTER MIAMI AND IT’S A GAME-WINNER 🤯
WHAT A MOMENT
(via @MLS)pic.twitter.com/SoF9dSrbDY
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) July 22, 2023
Big footprint
That’s been the big footprint of Messi in the USA. An increasing want for watching the sport, with arguably its best ever available to be watched. A reported 75 percent of rise was observed in aggregate viewership on Apple TV plus platform in the first two weeks of Messi wearing the Inter Miami pink. The tickets for Miami matches – both home and away – have sold out fast, the cheapest in some games going as far up as $422. Perhaps the only gloom in all of the joy have been the unaffordable price rates for a large section of fans. That the stands have still been full is indicative of the changing demographic of modern football’s in-stadia consumers.
“What Messi has done at this stage of his career, to the point that you’ve got kids that are probably watching him now, hearing about him for the first time, seeing him do incredible things, they are going to be able to go back and watch what he’s done at Barcelona and think to themselves, ‘Oh my god!’,” Wright adds.
That urge to run down the rabbit hole on YouTube would’ve been induced from his latest appearances in the pink kit. There were no goals – asss, yes – but the special little moments. Like for the second goal against LA: a pause inside the opposition half before fashioning a through ball to breach a two-defender marking. For the third, a run into the final third after poaching the ball from the midfield, setting a two-v-one scenario before decelerating, allowing the only defender to commit and then laying the ball for Leonardo Campana.

Messi drops two dimes to help lead @InterMiamiCF to a 3-1 win over LAFC in front of Leonardo DiCaprio, Selena Gomez, Prince Harry and more. pic.twitter.com/C49accgNuq
— Major League Soccer (@MLS) September 4, 2023
Besides the aforementioned there was another brief moment of magnificence, highlighting almost all of Messi’s attacking traits. A little run, a tw and a turn, an outside of the boot pass at the edge of the opposition box to undo a couple of defenders, and then a cute feint inside to leave another behind in his wake. John McCarthy’s left hand denied the Miami skipper. A similar play in New York a couple of weeks back however, had led to a goal. Messi, from Messi. An even-freakish outside of the boot through ball from the confines of less than a meters space inside the box with four defenders closing in.
With such exhibitions comes a loose argument from the critics, one that Wright isn’t particularly fond of. “No one can say, ‘oh, it’s just the standard of the league’. Because there’s something about him at this stage. Most players at this stage of their careers go into a sort of sadness.”
Football pros have come to the States before. Pele, Thierry Henry, David Villa, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, and even Beckham. But not at this peak a stage in their careers, having lifted the World Cup trophy less than a year back. And, having finished the tournament as the best player.
It’s been joy for him as well. It’s as his mate Neymar told Globo Esporte. “He went to heaven with the Argentina team, won everything in recent years, and with Paris he lived hell.” At Miami though, he’s just a celebration. Of everything that’s good or can be. A winner of everything at a club that never won anything until his arrival. A club that stood at the bottom of the Eastern Conference points table up until only recently. Winning a first piece of silverware in less than two months is bound to increase expectations on Messi, but he’s unlikely to be scrutinized for failure as he was at Barcelona, Paris or even back home in Argentina. The World Cup win in Qatar was always going to liberate him of the biggest burden he had in his career. His latest club has also freed him of the weightage that he was accustomed to in Europe.
The band reunion
There was an air of tragedy around Messi’s departure from Barcelona. Even more so when he admitted to not wanting to return to the club more recently. But if the Argentine didn’t go back to Barca, it came to Miami for him. A beautiful sub-plot in Messi’s recent utopia has been his reunion with former Camp Nou teammates in Jordi Alba and Sergio Busquets.
Once forming a lethal partnership at the La Liga club, the triumvirate, who have won everything there is to win in club football are presently rolling back the years at Miami. And judging the build up to the goal they combined for in the last game, it looks like the three haven’t missed a beat.Most Read
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Against LA, it was Busquets who located Messi from the centre of the park before the latter would spot a marauding Alba coming up from the left flank. Like clockwork.
But you have to go back a month to see the one Messi scored against Dallas FC off Alba’s ass. The goal which harkened back to one of the most famous El Clasico goals, showed the world that you can take the players out of Barcelona but not Barcelona out of the players.

Same vibe pic.twitter.com/BqdU0ROPsY
— FOOTTOON (@foottoon1) August 7, 2023
In the recreation, Alba, who was on the left flank, would spot a run from Messi at the edge of the box before threading in a low pass which the Argentine would slot in to the keeper’s right in first go. Six years ago, the duo had done the same in stoppage time with the scores level, to see off a famous 3-2 win at the Bernabeu. That was followed an instant, almost mythical Messi-shirt-off celebration, where he displayed the fabled number 10 and his name in front of the Real Madrid home supporters. What made the theater of it even more iconic was the stat: Messi had now scored 500 goals wearing the Barca shirt.

Against Dallas, there was no need for the shirt to be off once again. The high pressure days of Barcelona are behind them. So is the high press they once dealt with. There have been moments when Busquets has turned around towards the attacking half and not found an opposition press within a second. Moments when Messi has received the ball in the attacking half and received single coverage. When Alba has made a run deep into the left flank without being spotted. The MLS is yet to get used to them even though they’ve felt as home as they were in the Catalan capital. At Miami, Messi and his former Barca mates have been the rock band jamming off their classics from the yesteryears. One better stop everything else to enjoy their final tour together.