NEW YORK – The sights and sounds of an Inter Miami away trip are familiar a year into the Lionel Messi experience. There’s pre-match discussion about ticket prices and attendance records being set. Fellow travelers on the subway ask Messi jersey-sporting strangers when and where he’s about to play. Fans clad in Inter Miami pink and Argentina’s light blue and white line up in stadiums, regardless of the location. Vendors line the streets outside stadiums selling knockoff merchandise. Cheers for Messi are louder than those for anyone else by a noticeable margin, though his teammates occasionally benefit from the knock-on effect.
This is how the novelty of Messi becomes commonplace, sometimes an exercise in contrasting sentiments, as it was in Miami’s 1-1 draw with New York City FC at Yankee Stadium on Saturday. Those who hoped to score a glimpse of the World Cup winner had fortune on their side – the ankle injury that kept him out for two months was officially a thing of the past, and manager Tata Martino’s minute management meant the crowd at Atlanta United on Wednesday was sacrificed for the one in the Bronx over the weekend. Simply put, it was an ideal set-up for those who put in the effort — and the dollars — to be there.
What they saw, though, was a watered-down version of Messi Mania.
Though MLS credits him with a secondary assist on Leo Campana’s 75th-minute goal, Messi was far from his most magical self. He took just one shot and had less than 50 touches in his 90-minute shift,below his average of 4.22 shots a game and roughly 65 touches. He appeared to be in a light jog throughout, not for the first time during an injury-plagued season at the age of 37. It was one part of Miami’s overall underwhelming showing at Yankee Stadium when they mustered just six shots to NYCFC’s 17 and put together just 0.81 expected goals.
It felt like the natural conclusion to an eight-day, three-game stretch for the team. This is not to suggest that the Supporters’ Shield winners rely on Messi solely, but he can set the tone as Miami balance a mix of 30-something Barcelona graduates and younger talent – even if manager Gerardo “Tata” Martino claims otherwise.
“The performance of the match was good and that if not for the decision — terrible against [midfielder] Yannick Bright during the match — then we would’ve won the match,” he said via an interpreter in a post-match press conference, referencing a foul he believed went uncalled. “The team didn’t lack anything but the match lacked a good referee.”
The refereeing was naturally worth focusing on, considering a choppy game delivered much more in terms of fouls than highlight-reel-worthy moments, down to the fact that a member of Miami’s staff was sent off around the 70th minute. It was a tired, throwaway refrain from a match that was equally unmemorable, no matter the fanfare. The crowd was buzzy, but subdued as a result – a distant cry from the passionate and similarly pro-Miami crowd that attended his first MLS match across the Hudson River a year ago. Though that crowd only got 30 minutes of Messi, they got what their Yankee Stadium equivalent did not – a goal from the main attraction.
The most impassioned moment of the day may have come before kickoff, when NYCFC’s faithful presented a tifo referencing Barbie, calling the majority of the 44,000-plus in the crowd “plastic” and demanding they “support your local club.” It offers a critical lens at the Messi effect, which the league and its clubs hope will encourage people to do just that — support their local club – even if there are few signs right now that the people who make Messi Mania what it is are interested, though it may still be too early to tell.
Such is the push-and-pull of Messi Mania, an experience that seemingly hinges on one man alone but is more an exercise in the reaction he leaves everyone else with. His on-field powers may be waning, his in-stadium impact far from what it used to be. His star, though, has not dimmed in the slightest and remains the one undeniable quality of the Messi effect, as complicated as it is now becoming.
