Messi Will Not Play Against Orlando City – Mascherano

Inter Miami manager Javier Mascherano has come out to confirm that Lionel Messi will not be available to face Orlando City. He recently admitted that the journey would be too big a risk for the Argentine captain due to his busy schedule.

According to him, risking Messi at this time would be a crazy thing to do, but he is optimistic that Lionel would be fully ready to get back on the pitch.

Mascherano added that his immediate focus is on the two upcoming MLS matches before all attention shifts to the Leagues Cup match.

His words, “No, Leo will not be available tomorrow. Leo is okay, but obviously it would be crazy to take the risk of taking him to Orlando because of all that is ahead. We are optimistic that he will soon return with us.

Tigres is a great team, they showed that last night against Puebla, it is a team with players of hierarchy that always fights for important things in their league and internationally.

But when you play these tournaments, when you pretend you can cross one or the other, in the end, it isn’t in our hands to control that.

We did what was in our hands to qualify, by a little we couldn’t be leaders but now we will try to focus on the two upcoming MLS matches then we will focus on the Leagues Cup match.

We play to win, and to win all games. If we have the possibility to finish the regular season in first place that would be great, it’s good in terms of the advantages you can have in playoffs but we already saw last year that [having home advantage] doesn’t mean anything.

But our idea is to treat the 12 remaining MLS games to win all 12. If we have the possibility to play all three Leagues Cup games, to win Leagues Cup. And go game by game. The requirements and responsibility at this club is to go out and win all games we play.”

WOW.

Lionel Andrés Messi, also known as Leo Messi, is an Argentine professional footballer who plays as a forward for and captains both Major League Soccer club Inter Miami and the Argentina national team. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Messi has won a record seven Ballon d’Or awards and a record six European Golden Shoes, and in 2020 he was named to the Ballon d’Or Dream Team.

Until leaving the club in 2021, he had spent his entire professional career with Barcelona, where he won a club-record 35 trophies, including ten La Liga titles, seven Copa del Rey titles and the UEFA Champions League four times.

With his country, he won the 2021 Copa América and the 2022 FIFA World Cup. A prolific goalscorer and creative playmaker, Messi holds the records for most goals in La Liga (474), most hat-tricks in La Liga (36) and the UEFA Champions League (eight), and most assists in La Liga (192) and the Copa América (17).

He also has the most international goals by a South American male (103). Messi has scored over 800 senior career goals for club and country, and has the most goals by a player for a single club (672).