Lionel Messi is one step away from winning his first US title
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Lionel Messi has only one step left to chalk up the first trophy of the new American phase of his career. Inter Miami, to which the Argentine moved this summer, reached the final of the League Cup, beating away Philadelphia with a score of 4:1. One of the balls was chalked up by Messi. For the world champion and seven-time Ballon d’Or winner, this is the ninth goal for his current team in just six games. For comparison: Messi’s eternal rival – Cristiano Ronaldo – in the same six matches played this season for the Saudi An-Nasr, was marked by a third less performance.
Lionel Messi’s farewell to European club football (in July he announced that he would not renew his contract with PSG and continue his career in the United States, at Inter Miami), success in which made him a real icon, was not so long ago perceived as the actual end of a career, retirement. It is not surprising, given how many examples there were of outstanding players leaving to work in championships that did not coincide with their status and, as a result, they simply quietly left the stage. With Messi, obviously, everything is different. For Inter Miami, the Argentine played only six matches, but during this time I bought All-American star status. An achievement that even Pele himself did not submit to. In 1975-1977, the “king of football” played for the New York Cosmos, scored 37 goals in 64 matches for him, but for the American public he remained something secondary compared to the stars of basketball, baseball, American football and others. purely local entertainment.
An illustration of the Messi phenomenon can be provided by reports from the AP agency about the Argentinean’s last appearance on the field in the semi-finals of the League Cup (a solid tournament in which all teams of the top divisions of the American and Mexican leagues participate), in which Miami Inter played away with Philadelphia “. So the agency AP cites the words of a certain Angel Pagan from New Jersey. She, as it turned out, has a season ticket to the Philadelphia games. But at the same time, she and her family members came to the game in T-shirts with the inscription “Messi”. Moreover, they paid extra so that they were given places closer to the field: “to better see Messi.” “It was very, very expensive,” Ms. Pagan admitted. It’s no wonder why professional clubs in the US move so easily from city to city. In this country, it is not the club’s affection of the fans that is important, but only their sympathy for individual stars.
Angel Pagan was not at all cunning when she said that the opportunity to be a little closer to Messi is very expensive. According to Philadelphia’s official figures, tickets for the match against Inter Miami (the Philadelphia’s stadium, however, is small, only 20 thousand people) were sold out in just ten minutes. As a result, in the secondary market, tickets for seats that usually cost no more than $50 were sold for $1,000.
The average ticket price, according to calculations by a group of Philadelphia fans who call themselves the Sons of Ben, was $556. This is a record in the history of the club.
Even an hour before the start of the match, when speculators usually start dumping tickets, the price for them did not fall below $450.
People who paid hundreds of dollars just to visit the stadium where Lionel Messi plays are clearly not disappointed. Inter Miami won 4-1. One of the goals was scored by Messi. He scored beautifully, sending the ball into the corner with a long-range low shot. Just like in his best years at Barcelona. It remains to be seen what level the hype will reach in the League Cup final. In it, Inter Miami on August 20, and again away, will meet with Nashville.
In that goal of Messi, of course, there are questions to the goalkeeper of the hosts Andre Blake. In fact, he was not ready for the fact that his gates could attack in such a situation, and the moment overslept. But such trifles should not interfere with maintaining the reputation of Messi’s genius. Moreover, the Argentinean was good not only in this particular match. In all six games played for Inter Miami, he scored. In total, nine goals have already been scored, that is, one and a half goals per game. Yes, there are a lot of reservations about the level of tournaments in which Inter Miami plays, and therefore the level of defense players opposing Messi. Of course, in MLS there are also solid (not only in terms of achievements, but also in terms of age, like 36-year-old Messi) players. But in general, this is still something like the championship of the second tier of European championships. Just look at the Transfermarkt data on the value of MLS club squads.
So, Inter Miami is valued at €84 million, €35 million of which is Messi. That is, minus the Argentine, Inter Miami is at the level of the Russian Premier League club Rostov.
And the strongest team of the current championship – “Cincinnati” (“Inter Miami” while the worst in the league championship) – “costs” only €45 million. That is, less than the same “Rostov”.
However, you can approach the assessment of Messi’s performances at the final stage of his career in a slightly different way, comparing, for example, his results with those of his eternal rival Cristiano Ronaldo. He also left European football a little earlier (back in January 2023) than the Argentine and now plays for the Saudi An-Nasr. The Portuguese has one solid trump card in this correspondence confrontation. He has already won his first title with An-Nasr – Club Ronaldo last week became the owner Arab Champions Cup. But Messi has something to answer. Enthusiasts who maintain the messivsronaldo.app portal will come in very handy here. So, if we focus on the data they have collected, then Messi scores more often (1.5 goals per match versus 1 for the Portuguese), gives assists twice as often (10 versus 5), spends only 47 on scoring a goal, and not 83, as competitor, minutes. Well, and so on. That is, it turns out that Messi is better, no matter how you look at it. It remains to wait until he actually wins something.
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