ESPN FC
Futbol Americas: Inter Miami Loss Fallout + The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly + USMNT #9s Making News + Concern for Pulisic's Form
24 Feb 2026
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hello, hello, everyone. Happy Monday and welcome to a fresh edition of Football Americas. I'm Alexis Yunus alongside my fellow essential worker here, Alejandro Moreno, back despite yet another snowmageddon because we had to bring you this show, Ale. A couple of things we're going to talk about. We had to.
We have to. All right.
Couple of big things to talk about. Could Antoine Griezmann be heading to this side of the world? Also, Josh Sargent, it looks like he's finally on his way to MLS after things have soured at Norwich. And trust me, I know a thing or two about relationships souring, Ale.
Via text message as well.
Via text, via email. But there's also some even more good news for a lot of U.S. men's national team strikers. They've been banging in some goals at the weekend. We will be looking at that. But first, the big news. MLS is back. Inter Miami, the defending champions, were in action. And Lionel Messi was in action. action indeed.
You remember that we spoke to our Lizzie Becerrano about two weeks ago because he had picked up an injury and we were wondering if he'd be able to play in this game, Ale, knowing he has to manage his time, but he suited up for his boys against Young Sun Min and LAFC. Of course, Inter Miami playing a lot of their early games away from home, 37th minute. De Paul turning the ball to Sonny.
He passes it to Martinez and LAFC go up 1-0.
And it's not just David Martinez. It's Vamos Venezuela!
David Martinez. All right. Well, into the 52nd minute now. Messi losing the ball, recovers. He tries to get a shot in, curling, but just wide. Just, you know, scraping off a little bit of the cobwebs there. Okay. Okay. He is Messi. 63rd minute. Percedame here with a chance.
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Chapter 2: What happened in Inter Miami's loss to LAFC?
All right, so the season opener for the defending champions not going well. Now, there were a lot of people wondering how they were going to contain Inter Miami and Lionel Messi. Well, if you have a look at these stats, no shots on goal from the Argentine. Well, I would say they contained him very, very well. Let's hear from Mark Dos Santos about what the game plan was to contain the Argentine.
When we prepared the game, we prepared the game against the best Messi possible. I don't know if he took a pill. I don't know what happens. We just prepare for the best Messi. And when you prepare for the best Messi, around the box you have to have numbers around him. And when he has the ball and the ball is uncovered,
you have to make sure that you follow the late runs because he finds so well the players in the pocket. Then when he starts running and playing one-twos, you have to follow, you have to continue with your runs. I think that part of our game today, A+. Part of possession, D. We can be much better and we want to be much better. But, you know, again, I come back.
Our guys, we're a team, suffered together. We're smart dealing with a lot of plays. And that's important moving forward.
All right, very happy Marcos Santos there for this one. All right, Ale, let's get into it. Now, it's only the first game of the season, but I still have so many questions going on. How much of a statement win was this for LAFC? How much can we read into it? Do we just say, okay, you know, Inter-Miami just dusting off some, you know, early season cobwebs probably.
But to see a Lionel Messi go into a game with no shots on target is something we're not used to, despite his age.
No, and I think it's much more about LAFC than it is about Inter-Miami. And as I told you and I told Lizzy a couple of weeks ago, there'll be a lot of games like this. There'll be a lot of games like this for Inter-Miami where you get an underperforming Lionel Messi leading up to the World Cup up until he finds the rhythm that he wants to find, building momentum going into the World Cup.
Do you feel he was managing himself 100%?
There weren't a lot of sprints by Lionel Messi. I'll just say that. And that's not new, necessarily. It's just that usually when he finds himself in those positions that Mark Dos Santos, the manager of LAFC, was talking about, we see a change of pace from Lionel Messi. We didn't see that all that often in the match against LAFC.
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Chapter 3: What were the highlights of MLS Week 1?
But there will be more important games this season than this one was. And you turn the page and you move on to next week. Truth is, if you think about Inter-Miami against LAFC, specifically in this game, it wasn't just Lionel Messi. The first goal comes from a really poor turnover from Rodrigo de Paul.
And so while the reporters, just like us, are always going to ask about Lionel Messi, and Marcos Santos has to answer a question about Lionel Messi, one of the things that LAFC did really well was deny the service to Lionel Messi in advantageous positions.
And in order to do that, they did really well at pressing Rodrigo Deport, and pressing whenever Inter Miami got in a position where they're trying to look up and find Lionel Messi.
Now, Messi wasn't moving all that well, and then the good pressure that LAFC was putting on guys like Rodrigo Deport then was making it more difficult for Inter Miami to get themselves in a situation in which Messi could be dangerous. There are a lot of things and a lot of layers to this performance from LAFC that you can hang on to and be encouraged if you're at LAFC. That's what I'm getting at.
No, no, no. Your question was, is this a statement win? Well, I suppose.
To encourage their fans maybe to believe that they could be contenders for the season because I'd be feeling mighty high after a win like this. Just saying. Lean into joy.
It's February. It's February.
It's February.
It's also February.
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Chapter 4: How are USMNT #9s performing in their respective leagues?
Sinclair was out of the play and by then the defender was never gonna catch up with you. Dane Sinclair did the worst thing that you could do which is nothing. He didn't come out. He didn't stay in his goal or somewhere inside his 18-yard box. He went into a land of death. There's nothing to achieve there. Darkness is what exists in that place and Denis Buanga was able to take advantage of it.
He thrived in that darkness. Let's hope Jesse Marsh wasn't watching that one a little too close. All right.
Well, it was catastrophic.
It was catastrophic. Let's hear from Javier Mascherano in terms of what he thought of this game. Now, he said this. The reality is that they beat us fair and square. That's the truth. I think it's often difficult to explain when you lose 3-0, three goals in a match. But my initial analysis gives me the feeling that the results was somewhat misleading.
The game, as it unfolded, there wasn't that much of a difference. Oh, okay. Is he just trying to do some damage control?
Didn't the first part of that quote say they won fair and square? Yeah, they beat us fair and square.
But maybe he's trying to say it didn't look like that much of a beatdown.
Right. Well, let me just say to Javier Macerano, I wholeheartedly disagree. No estamos de acuerdo. Absolutely 100% got beat and should have gotten beat. LAFC were far better than Inter Miami. And if I want to take it a step further, if Macerano really wants to talk facts, then we can talk facts. Yeah, of course. I'm all about facts. First half should have been 3-0 already.
You think about Son and how he went on a 1v1 situation with the goalkeeper, he just couldn't quite sort out his feet, ends up sort of having to cut the ball back, and Buanga, his shot gets clear of the line. That should have been a goal. David MartĆnez, vamos Venezuela, he scored a goal and also had yet another opportunity where he was 1v1 against Dane Sinclair and hit it wide.
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Chapter 5: What are the concerns surrounding Christian Pulisic's form?
When he hears the voice of Luis Suarez and he sees who's grabbing him, he probably looked back and like, what?
He had to do a double take. What?
You're usually with me in this. You're usually at the forefront of this. You're leading the way. You're holding me back? As it pertains to Lionel Messi, I do believe that, I'm surprised, there's preferential treatment in Major League Soccer. There always has been and there will always be preferential treatment.
For them to hide in the loophole of saying, well, that wasn't technically the referee's room. Okay, it might not have been the referee's room. You enter that door and then there's another door that is the referee's room, right? for them to say, well, it's not an area in which players are prohibited or restricted to the players, so therefore there's nothing wrong with this. It's nonsense.
The spirit of it is Lionel Messi was talking to the referees all the way down the tunnel, and then when there was a time for him to continue to keep walking, he decided to come back around and enter through the threshold of the door. A door that leads eventually to a referee's room. So in essence, he was chasing down referees to go and complain about this, that on the other.
So look, if MLS, I suppose by the letter of the law, they can hide in this loophole and they're very comfortable and they don't want to create a situation with Messi so early on in the season and so, Nothing to see here. I'm fine. I don't care. Nothing to see here. But let's not pretend that this is not preferential treatment.
And had it been, I'll turn it right back around, had it been Luis Suarez... Would be seeing a different story. Going through the threshold of the door and going right in there, you think he's getting the same treatment?
I doubt it.
I don't think so.
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