Inter Miami 4-0 Charlotte FC: Messi scores again! | Live Postgame Show

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I don't know if there's been any updates just yet. No, a minute 86. Yeah, a minute 86 and they're 1-1 right now. So this might end up going to penalties. So we'll see. Just for reference, if Philadelphia win, Miami will play in Chester, Pennsylvania at Super Bowl Park against Philadelphia. And if not, then Miami gets to play the semifinal match at home. I think that game will be August 15th, which is Tuesday. But let's get into the match and what we saw. Kind of a lesser entertaining one, to say the least. But it was still 4-0. Gian, what are your initial reactions to what you saw, at least from Messi right off the bat? Because he wasn't that involved in this one, was he? No, no, not at all. I think it was like a strange game. We somehow dominated without dominating. It was weird. We're so used to these. I think these last few games with Messi, we've just kind of been accustomed to seeing the Messi magic and just Messi doing things that we're just not used to. He had a solid game, but more of a quiet game. Even just the entire team was more quiet. They were very settled. So it was a little strange. I think that what we had anticipated the score being, we were pretty close to that. We had thought like a 4-1 or 3-1. So it was kind of a lopsided game. But for sure, a lot more of a less very dominating, non-stop attacking. A lot of what we're used to seeing from Inter. So it was definitely an interesting game. Now, there were some improvements though. And let's start with the discussions that we were having all week within the midfield. I think that the insertion event on Kramerski really helped. And I think that Charlotte didn't do a really good job at finding any gaps between Arroyo and Busquets and Kramerski alike, like FC Dallas were. And that's why I think you saw a clean sheet in this one, giving up four goals now to only give up none tonight. What did you see from the defensive aspect of the midfield and even the central defenders that you didn't see against FC Dallas? Well, I think they were a lot more precise. The communication was there. One thing that I noticed that we saw very similarly to the Dallas game was just our fullbacks playing very high up. Arroyo, same as last time, kind of making that backline of three. But what the adjustment that I did notice that was a bit different was what you and me had talked about, where Busquets was playing a lot higher up in that Dallas game and where now he was actually playing not as high up. He was kind of like sometimes, you know, sometimes Arroyo would go up, sometimes Busquets would go, but they were kind of very solid in that midfield. But Amasi did a really good job as well of making sure that he was part of the, you know, creation, but also coming back when he needed to. Sometimes I saw him go really deep into the defense. So I think that that was an adjustment that really helped out. And it was interesting, like not to get too ahead of ourselves, because we'll obviously talk about the first half and then the second half and that sort of thing. But, you know, there were a lot of opportunities from Charlotte, surprisingly. Like they had a lot of opportunities, a lot of centers. And I know we've struggled with that in the past, especially like balls in the air and that sort of thing. But the team was very solid when it came to defending that. I mean, there was a ton of centers, especially in the second half. And the defense did a pretty solid job of making sure that none of those turned into anything that was remotely, you know, possibly a goal. So yeah, yeah, I agree. And I think that one thing to note was the positioning between Busquets and Arroyo didn't actually change as much as I thought it was. In the first couple of minutes, I thought that it would look more like a double pivot. But I still saw Arroyo out over on that right side, and I thought that it would kind of hinder what was going on. But you made a really good point. Sergio Busquets was not pushing up as high as he was in that Dallas match, and not even remotely as much. And I think you can see that he controls the game a lot better from the positions that he was playing at this level in this one. And you can look at the passing numbers from that Dallas match onto this one. You can see where Miami controlled the possession. A lot of it was playing through Sergio Busquets. I think that's going to be really important for them going forward. Obviously, it's going to be important. It is Sergio Busquets, one of the best midfielders of all time. But I really think it showed from one game to the next, how just how important it is for him to stay grounded in that certain area. Yeah, and Tata uses Arroyo because you're mentioning and you made that same observation in the last game where he plays a lot like towards the right side. But that's like, I feel like that's by design by Tata because he's covering that space that Yedlin is leaving. Every time Yedlin pushes up, Arroyo moves over to the right side and makes sure that he's covering that space. So it's definitely by design for sure. Yeah, and let's talk a little bit about what went on up front because it took a while for Miami to get into this one offensively. I don't think that there were many shots on target outside of the goals. And, you know, they did score the penalty early on. I think it was the 11th minute or so. We were kind of expecting another messy goal inside the 10th minute and things like that, but it just didn't happen. I guess this is kind of a negative thing to do, but where are you because the team won 4-0. So it's really so insane to be having this conversation. It's weird, I know, right? It's so weird, but I do think that there's blame to be placed with some of these attackers and what went on early on in this game because it wasn't as clear cut as an offense as we've seen over the last couple of matches. I thought that Jordi Alba was great going forward. But when I thought of Robert Taylor and Joseph Martinez, it took them a little bit to get into the match. And I would say the same for Lionel Messi as well. But again, he just requires so much attention that frees up everybody else so simply and freely. What do you make of the Joseph Martinez performance tonight? It seemed like Tata kind of had enough and that's where he saw the substitution. But after scoring the penalty, it was kind of lackluster in my opinion. I think it's been that way for quite some time. Yeah, I think that, you know, unfortunately, we were talking about how and even Tata had acknowledged in the press conference earlier this week before the game that Joseph didn't really have a good game last game. We were used to him kind of being more involved those first two games of the League's Cup than last game against Dallas. He wasn't too involved. And then this game, he was just very in my eyes, like he was more worried about making the play than actually finishing the play. And it was so many, there were so many opportunities at the beginning of the game that he just was not very, he just decided like, I'm not going to finish this. I'm either going to try to make that extra pass. I'm going to, there was one where he had the ball was coming to him right outside the box. I thought, I can't remember. It was outside the box or right, like right inside, but he dummied it with nobody behind him where he could have easily taken that shot. So there were a lot of those instances where Joseph was, again, just trying to make that extra pass when at his position, some of those are, you just need to have your eye on the goal and you need to shoot on them. But I will say, well, go ahead, go ahead. Well, I was saying, I think Kampana brings that and you saw that, you know, there was a ball over the top that I can't remember who, I think it was Jordi Alva who played it in and, you know, Kampana was there and Messi was right behind him and you saw Kampana just take full ownership, took it off the stress and tied it, you know, that's a striker's job. And, you know, he took it away from Messi, but at the same time, I think that this team needs a number nine who can get in and around the area. I don't know how much you need your striker right now to be playing off of, you know, the other attackers rather than be in a position to score goals when Messi is advancing the ball. That's kind of where I'm leaning right now. I think Tata over the next couple of matches might be leaning that way too. Joseph, I don't think's been subbed off that early. And I think that there was real reason behind it other than, I just, I don't think that it was having to do with, you know, tiredness or anything like that. I think it was a tactical substitution that, you know, we want to get Kampana on and seal the deal with this game. And that's exactly what they did. Yeah, and just to mention something that, you know, about Joseph's play. In the press conference, Tata Martino was asked about Joseph's kind of lackluster play against Dallas where he was like, yeah, you know, maybe he wasn't necessarily up to par as to what we were kind of getting used to him doing. But that what's most important, I guess, is that he's able to facilitate the game up front, even if it's not with goals. So I do want to, I know that he had a bad game, but I also do want to point out the good things that he did, even though, you know, in this game, there wasn't so much of it. But like on that Robert Taylor goal, you know, maybe he doesn't necessarily score on that. But if we really look at the play, like Yedlin had the ball on the right wing. And as he comes in, Messi is able to take a defender with him towards the left. But then Joseph is also able to drag the center back with him as he makes that run to the right, leaving that wide open gap in the middle for Robert Taylor to come in. So that was kind of something that Tata had spoken about before where, you know, he said, whether I put Campana in or I put Joseph in, what's most important to me is that they're able to participate in the game planning and make sure that they're able to make the plays as a team. So that's something that he did do well. He was able to kind of do that a bit. But again, just not as aggressive as he should be in the position that he's in for sure. Yeah, I completely agree. And I think that this will be a conversation among not only the coaching staff and everybody like that, but for us as well, because it's something to consider going forward. We were always going to have this debate because coming in Tata Martino never really looked to play two strikers. And so, you know, some people kind of want that. However, you don't take Robert Taylor off the pitch given everything that's been going on. Realistically, it's going to be a debate from game to game, week to week, whatever you want to call it. Is it Campana? Is it Joseph? We'll have to see. But Miami have scored four goals. So four goals in their last, what, three, four games? I think they scored three against Orlando, four against Dallas, four now, four against Atlanta. So the amount of goals that they've been scoring has just been ridiculous. And tonight we didn't even think for, I think, 86 minutes that Messi was even going to have a goal contribution. This team is still up 3-0 with a possible chance for a fourth as well. And I'm going to say that's a good thing too if you really think about it like that. In a night where, you know, we're just so used to Messi like bailing us out on all these games, it's what's talked about. Like some of these games, in all honesty, like as big as we are fans as well, like some of these games we should have lost. And it was Messi that was able to put us over the top. So it's kind of nice to see a different game where maybe Messi, you know, he was definitely involved in certain things, but maybe not as involved as he's been in the previous games. Maybe not putting the team on his back like he's done in the previous games. And somehow Miami was still able to score and not be pressured by Charlotte. It was a more of a relaxed game, but still it's just something to point out that I think it's a good thing. On a night where Messi didn't shine necessarily, we were still able to take care of business and other players were able to. It was more of a team game, an all-around team game. And that was nice to see. Yeah. And speaking of that, I mean, it's just the stats speak for itself. Still over 50% possession. Everything has been a part of 62% tonight. In the first half, that was at 65. It went down a little bit in the second. I think that a lot of that had to do with the substitutions that Charlotte made early on in the second half and the pressures they put on because they were really trying to get on the ball. But Miami still prevailed. They still kept a really good average of possession. Ended up with six big chances, seven shots on target. Just only two saves for Drake Callender tonight. It wasn't a crazy performance from him, but I do think another thing to note in what we saw tonight was the rapidness that Drake Callender played with playing out of the back. I think that Tata and the goalkeeping staff has worked a lot on that with Drake. It's not something that was, you know, in the upper echelon of his skills in terms of distribution and things like that. But tonight, I liked what I saw. He was obviously commanding as always, coming out of the six to reach balls in the air and things like that, but he got the play started really quickly. And I think with the quality that's on this team now that Miami have never had before, he's able to do that. And as this team improves in terms of chemistry and as he improves with distribution, that's going to set Miami, along with their star players and the depth, that in and of itself can set Miami apart from these other teams down the stretch. I think it's actually going to be a lot more important than people realize. And Tata has spoken about playing out from the back and you've seen it being developed into this team from game to game. And he, like I said, he talked about it early on when his first couple of days with Miami. So that's another keynote there. What else did you see, John? Any other keynotes you have before I give a couple updates on this Philadelphia-LA game? Or Philadelphia-Miami-LA game? Yeah, I just, I think that we saw kind of like what we were expecting from Charlotte and what we were expecting Miami would have to deal with is a high-pressing team. They came in with, I believe it was like a four, Charlotte came in with like a four, two, three, one. And it ended up working out. Cause you might think like maybe just the one up front is not going to pressure a lot, but they like that four, two, three, one did such a good job of like shutting down the different outlets or different passing outlets that it was like, we're just so used to playing with the ball and having the time to touch and that sort of thing. And especially more so even the first half, not so much in the second half cause we let them play very much. We gave them the ball pretty much a lot of the second half, but they did a really good job of closing our outlets and making it really difficult. But yeah, that was one thing I noticed. And then just the second half was basically us giving them the ball, us relaxing and then just taking opportunities off of the counter. So it was a very different game than we're used to seeing. The second half was so open. I mean, it was like back and forth, back and forth. It was kind of what you expect in an August MLS match between two sides, especially in South Florida, because I'm not saying that the weather itself, but the physicality levels and the endurance levels, I mean, they take a toll absolutely on these players and games do get open. And if you're new to the league, if you're new to MLS and these kinds of teams, it's kind of what happens down the stretch. And Miami are gonna have a lot of these kinds of games leading up to their playoff push. Like I said, I've said this multiple times on the podcast and our live shows, 12 games remaining in MLS. I know we're headed to the semifinal of Intercontinental Tournament and we have a US Open Cup to play as well, but there's still a league that's gonna follow this one almost immediately. I think the game that's being readjusted with Charlotte that was supposed to be played on the 20th will happen before, at least on his 30th. So that is something to look out for, especially with that US Open Cup semifinal. But once the league gets going, these guys are gonna have a lot of pressure on their backs. These guys are gonna have games that are going to open up and they're gonna have to stay strong defensively. And I think tonight really showed that because against FC Dallas, we were like, man, is this defense going to be able to withhold these kinds of games that get a little bit crazy? And the defense did nothing and you had Messi as a hero tonight. No Messi as a hero, didn't need him. And the defense held strong. So overall, this is going to be a huge, huge, huge boost for Tata Platinum's side. Have a quick update here. With 10 minutes of added time, Philadelphia scores at the 99th, 15th minute mark. Oh, man. So, and Philly's a tough team. Miami have struggled with Philly in the past, but also have gotten the better of Philly in the past. That means that this game on Tuesday, if the result holds, I'm taking a peek over right now. We're looking, we're looking, we're looking. Oh, it's going to a VAR, Gian. A VAR. We'll get an update here shortly from Alejandro. We want a home game. So we know what we're rooting for. So it's questionable. There's really some uncertainty, but it's an offside decision that they're looking at. So if Philadelphia win, if Philadelphia win and this goal stands, it will be played at Subaru Park, which is a tough place to play. Has the goal been confirmed? We're waiting. This is, this is great. Home advantage has been helpful for Miami. That, that's true. The one test that they've had on the road so far was that tough game at Dallas. And I've just been told, Gian, that the goal stands. So playing away to Philadelphia is a lot harder than playing away to Dallas. Yeah. I do think that Jim Curtin has a better side there with a lot of the players. Carranza being one of them. Leon Flock, who came on, I believe, as a substitute in this one. And Gosdog and just, it's a tough, tough team. Gosdog gave us a fit last time we played. So yeah. So away to Subaru Park potentially on Tuesday. I believe that's the day that's been set. And no matter what, though, Miami will also play on August 19th in either a third place match or a final in the League's Cup. It's not, you know, obviously determined which one yet because they have to play on the 15th, but because they won tonight, there are still two games remaining for Miami League's Cup, no matter what. Yeah. And that gives us an opportunity to make it. We've basically got two games to make it to the CONCACAF Champions. Obviously, if we win the finals, obviously we make it. If not, we go for, I think, third place. And if we get third place, we'd also make it. So that's all for it as well. I want to give another quick shout out to one of our sponsors here, L'Aqua Azura. I can't say enough great things about them for all pool servicing and pool maintenance here in South Florida. You can go ahead and check them out at the website you see below, L'AquaAzura.com. They do a great job over 20 years in the business, five-star on Google reviews, and they will give you a free quote for any project that you hit them up with. And if you do sign up for pool servicing with L'Aqua Azura and you mention our show, Messy & Co. Five Reasons Sports, they will give you your first month free. So go ahead and check out our friends over at L'Aqua Azura. Oh man, a lot going on tonight, Zion. And it's been every single day that we've had a lot going on. Yeah, yeah. But I want to touch back on a lot of the conversation and discourse that we've had over the week, again, on the midfield, but not about Ben Hunt, not about Sergio, and not about Dixon Arroyo, but substitution appearance from Dixon, or not Dixon, sorry, Diego Gomez. It's a promising one, especially going forward, was it not? Yeah, yeah. That was actually nice to see. Like, you know, once the game was pretty much, I don't know if under wraps, but it was very, very well controlled. So why not give the guy that is very promising, a promising player, somebody that confides in very much, that he handpicked himself the opportunity to come in after having, you know, maybe not the best start, not to say he played bad, but, you know, he came in highly spoken about. And I think that he did very well. He did very well today. We saw him go up, as we always expect him to go up and attack. He also, I saw a few good plays on defense. He brought the ball up very well. So I'm actually happy for what we saw from Gomez. And that's kind of the approach that I had kind of suggested from the very beginning with him is to kind of ease him into the whole system little by little. I... Put Gian on the touchline. But I mean, you know, it's tough to say, you know, swap him in for, you know, to start over Kremasky. That's the decision I'll leave for Tata. But I've just always thought that, again, you want to bring him in slowly. You don't want to rush him. Sometimes when you rush things, obviously they don't come out like you want them to. But I think that he definitely had a good performance today. It's very promising. And we'll see if Tata kind of rides this same pattern the next couple of games with Gomez coming in. I think he does, honestly. I think that's probably how it'll be. Also, just depending on the game. If the game is kind of in control at the end, he'll come in. Or if maybe Kremasky's maybe... Because obviously all players can, you know, maybe have a down game. If Kremasky's having a down game, maybe he comes in a little earlier. But I love the approach. And I hope he kind of continues this approach over the next couple of games for sure. And as we wrap up here, I think one thing that, you know, we've already talked about kind of subconsciously, but it's going to become even more evident down the stretch is that there are a lot of position battles. With Joseph and Kampana. With Kremasky and Diego Gomez. We still haven't seen Fukunofari coming. What will that be like with Robert Taylor? We still haven't seen Tomas Javiles coming. What will that be like with any shift in the center back to the back line? Krivstov or Miller who have looked slow sometimes in transition. So a lot of conversations there to be had going down the stretch. Gian, give us some final thoughts here. And going into Tuesday, what do you think about the matchup against Philadelphia? Just real quickly. Okay, so real quick tidbit before we do that. One thing, especially just talking about like the different positions and the different competitions we're going to have for some of these places. I just want to say that Tata did mention, and this is something interesting to keep an eye out on, that Fukunofari, depending on what the game plan is, can play at the nine position. So that's just something to keep in mind from the word, from the mouth of Tata Martino. So with Joseph and Campana struggling at times and maybe not being as aggressive as they should, Tata has left the door open for Fukunofari to play the nine. So just something to keep an eye out on. But in regards to what's next for Inter, I think that like you mentioned, it's definitely going to be a lot tougher game. It's going to be against a tougher opponent and it's going to be an away game. So we already saw a very resilient team in Dallas. We saw a very resilient team that went down multiple times, didn't give up and came back at the end to take that win away from home. So I think that that was a really good game to kind of prepare us for what we're going to be up for in Philadelphia. Philadelphia is a tough team, a really well attacking team. And I think that we can pull it off with Messi captaining the team. I'm really not, I feel like kind of unstoppable. I feel like we can beat anybody, but not to say it's going to be a walk in the park. I don't think that either. I think this is going to be a really tough game. And what a test because it looks very much to me like we might be facing the LA team in the finals who is just on a tear. So this is going to be a really important game and I definitely can't wait to see what happens. So with that, we've kind of come to the end of the post game show where we had an interesting game today, one that was a bit different from what we kind of had been accustomed to so far with Inter, but nonetheless, a game that we scored four goals and now we rest and next week we'll be facing Philadelphia. So just make sure you guys tune in we'll be having a episode this week and then obviously we'll be doing the post game as well on after the Philadelphia match, which hopefully ends up being a win. We want to thank our sponsors as always. Make sure you guys tune in. You can catch us on Spotify. You can catch us on Apple podcast as well as on YouTube. So thank you guys. Hope you guys have a good night and we'll catch you guys on the next one.