Substitute Fafà Picault scored for Inter Miami CF in the 89th minute, and Lionel Messi struck for the first time this MLS regular season in a dramatic 2-1 victory at Atlanta United FC on Sunday.
Miami (3-1-0) triumphed despite six saves from Atlanta’s Brad Guzan, who played an integral role in his team’s upset of Messi’s squad in a best-of-three series last fall in the opening round of the MLS Cup playoffs. Atlanta shocked the Supporters’ Shield winners by claiming the rubber match 3-2 on the road to eliminate Messi and Miami from the playoffs.
Messi’s goal on Sunday came in the 20th minute of just his second regular-season appearance for Miami, which already has played eight matches because of Concacaf Champions Cup action. The World Cup winner started after being sidelined for three games due to muscle fatigue before coming off the bench on Thursday night in a 2-0 win at Cavalier FC of Jamaica.
“Well, Leo’s goal, he’s the best player in the history of this sport, there’s nothing more to say,” Miami manager Javier Mascherano said after the game. “He’s a player who has the ability to score the most beautiful [goal] you can see. The goal from Fafà obviously makes us very happy for him. We came from three hard weeks because he had been out. We’re very happy.
“He’s come to contribute his experience in this league. But he’s been humble, working as a team, knowing to use the moments when we need it. So, we are delighted with him.”
The start for Messi came on the heels of Mascherano defending the usage of his star player early in the season.
Emmanuel Latte Lath scored his third goal in the 11th minute to give Atlanta (1-1-2) an early lead. But his teammates are still stuck on one goal combined as Atlanta’s winless run extended to three matches after defeating Montreal in their season opener.
Both teams had plenty of chances for a second-half winner from open play, but the diminutive Picault provided an unlikely header to ultimately decide the game.
Jordi Alba got the ball out wide from a late, short corner kick and sent an outswinging ball to the back post. Picault outmuscled Ajani Fortune and sent a header bouncing back across goal, somehow wrong-footing Guzan and nestling the ball inside the far left post.
It was Picault’s first goal for his sixth MLS club, having moved to Miami from Vancouver this past offseason.
Miguel Almirón started the attack, opening the scoring for Atlanta with an excellent ball over the top to play Brooks Lennon down the right. Lennon then played an excellent cross that Latte Lath met with a powerful back-post header past Rocco Ríos Novo.
Latte Lath thought he had his second just after the quarter-hour mark, but it was ruled offside. Miami pulled level on its next foray forward.
Guzan sprawled off his line to disrupt an initial cross from the right, but Messi surprised Bartosz Slisz with some rare defensive pressure to dispossess the midfielder as Atlanta tried to play out. From there, Messi weaved his way past the sliding Derrick Williams then deftly chipped the charging Guzan.
Mascherano added his appreciation for MLS as a league and that the quality of its players has grown drastically during his short time as Miami coach.
“I paid a lot of attention to Inter-Miami because the reality is that, like all Argentines, we followed Inter Miami, but I wasn’t paying attention to other teams, which surprised me,” Mascherano said. “There are many teams that have very good ideas that execute very well. I started to meet players who have a high, good level who are in this league but who could also be in a European league. In fact, I think we have some of our players who I didn’t pay so much attention to before, perhaps, because we didn’t know them; and now, the truth is, they have surprised me.
“It’s a league that I like. I like its organization. I like that everything works. I like that I have to worry about training the team and preparing for games.”
Atlanta United will play at FC Cincinnati on Saturday. Inter Miami is idle until it hosts the Philadelphia Union on March 29.
Information from Reuters and The Associated Press was used in this story.
