Lionel Messi kept up his amazing goal-scoring streak as Inter Miami beat Philadelphia Union 4-1 to advance to the Leagues Cup final on Tuesday.
In an exciting semi-final at Philadelphia’s Subaru Park, the Argentine star scored his ninth goal in six games for Miami.
Josef Martinez, Jordi Alba, and David Ruiz, who came on as a replacement, scored the other goals for Miami. Alejandro Bedoya scored the only goal for Philadelphia, which was badly outmatched.
The result means that Messi will now lead Miami into the 42nd final of his career when the World Cup-style event for teams from Mexico and Major League Soccer comes to a close on Saturday. The win also makes sure that Miami will play in the CONCACAF Champions Cup next year, which is the best club event in the area.
In theory, Tuesday’s semi-final in Philadelphia was supposed to be the hardest game Messi had played since he joined Miami from Paris Saint-Germain on July 21.
Philadelphia is one of the best teams in MLS. They are third in the standings for the Eastern Conference, while Miami is last.
The Union have also been almost unbeatable at home. In their last 38 games at Subaru Park, they have only lost once.
But just three minutes after the game started, Miami took the lead, throwing the home team into chaos.
Sergii Kryvtsov, a Ukrainian defender, sent a long pass forward that caused confusion in the Union back line. Martinez caught the pass and fired a shot past Philadelphia goalie Andre Blake, who was diving for the ball.
Five minutes later, when Daniel Gazdag of Hungary got through to the goal, he should have tied the game, but he shot straight at Miami goalie Drake Callender.
After 19 minutes, Gazdag had another good chance, but his curling shot from the edge of the box went just wide.
If that chance gave Philadelphia hope, it didn’t last long because Messi scored again to punish the Union’s poor defense.
Damion Lowe was caught off guard, and Martinez turned away from the defender to pass the ball to Messi. Messi had way too much time and space to send a low, hard shot from outside the box into the bottom corner past Blake.
Philadelphia kept up the pressure, and Gazdag tested Callender with a sharp shot from a long distance on the 29th minute.
Even though Union had a lot of ground and time on the ball, it was Miami who scored the game-winning goal just before halftime.
Robert Taylor, a player from Finland, kept the ball well in the middle of the field and took his time before passing it to Jordi Alba, who was coming in from the side.
The former star of Barcelona controlled the ball and scored a clean goal to put Miami up 3-0 at the half.
In the second half, Philadelphia’s coach Jim Curtin didn’t play it safe and changed his team’s shape to add another attacker.
But Union wasted two good chances when Chris Donovan went around Callender on the 55th minute and shot over the bar.
At 66 minutes, Jakob Glesnes missed a great chance to score when he hooked the ball over the crossbar from close range.
Bedoya’s goal in the 73rd minute from a wild corner gave Philadelphia hope, but Ruiz’s goal six minutes later gave the away team a three-goal lead again, ending any chance of a comeback.