Lionel Messi Scores 100th Inter Miami Goal in Campeones Cup Win

Lionel Messi has scored his 100th Inter Miami goal in just his 115th appearance for the club, helping the MLS Cup champions beat Cruz Azul 2-0 to lift the Campeones Cup at Nu Stadium.

Messi headed Luis Suárez’s cross past Kevin Mier after 24 minutes before later delivering the corner for Casemiro to make it 2-0. It gave Miami another trophy, gave Cristian “Kily” González one in his first match as manager and gave Messi another number that looks slightly daft when you remember he only arrived in Florida in July 2023.

He’s 39 now. He’s got a World Cup, eight Ballons d’Or, four Champions Leagues and more than 800 senior goals behind him. For most players, heading to MLS at 36 would mean winding things down. Messi has spent the three years since doing pretty much the opposite.

And yes, I can already hear the Ronaldo fans shouting that MLS isn’t La Liga or the Premier League. Fair enough. Nobody’s pretending it is. Scoring 100 goals after arriving at a new club at 36 is still some going, though, and plenty of brilliant players have found out that America isn’t quite the automatic goal factory people sometimes make it out to be.

Messi has 69 goals in 75 MLS regular-season appearances. Zlatan Ibrahimović was on a similar tear with 52 in 56 for LA Galaxy, but the numbers drop off from there. David Villa scored 77 in 117 for New York City, Thierry Henry managed 51 in 122 for the Red Bulls and Wayne Rooney got 23 in 48 at DC United.

Across every competition, Messi’s Miami century is split between 11 goals in 2023, 23 in 2024, a fairly absurd 43 last year and another 23 already this season. Earlier in 2026, he also became the fastest player in MLS history to reach 100 regular-season goal contributions, doing it in 64 games. Sebastián Giovinco’s previous record was 95.

Then there’s Cruz Azul.

They were there for number one too.

Messi made his Inter Miami debut against the Mexican side on 21 July 2023, coming off the bench alongside Sergio Busquets before curling a free-kick into the top corner in the 94th minute to win it.

It was his first goal in pink and the start of Inter Miami’s first trophy run. A few weeks later, a club that had only entered MLS in 2020 were Leagues Cup champions.

Things have moved fairly quickly since.

Miami won the 2024 Supporters’ Shield with an MLS-record 74 points, followed it by lifting their first MLS Cup last season and have now added the Campeones Cup. They’ve won silverware in every season Messi has spent at the club, with Inter Miami officially describing Wednesday’s success as their fifth title when last year’s Eastern Conference championship is included.

Cruz Azul didn’t exactly turn up just to play their part in the Messi story either. They had 18 shots to Miami’s seven, forced Dayne St. Clair into six saves and hit the post through Gabriel Fernández. Miami had to ride parts of the game, but Messi was there when they needed him, scoring the first before creating Casemiro’s second.

González probably couldn’t have asked for a much better introduction either. He’d only taken his first training session the previous day after replacing Javier Mascherano, with Miami having won just once in their previous five MLS matches.

Messi apparently told his new manager beforehand that he’d make him a champion.

One game in, promise kept.

It’s also the first trophy Inter Miami have lifted at their new 26,700-capacity Nu Stadium. When Messi arrived in the summer of 2023, Miami were playing in a temporary home in Fort Lauderdale and had never won a trophy. Just over three years later, they’ve got a new stadium, an MLS Cup, an MLS points record and a number 10 with 100 goals to his name.

There’ll always be arguments about Messi and Ronaldo, the standard of MLS, different eras and who actually deserves to be called the GOAT. Football supporters have spent the best part of 20 years arguing about it, so I wouldn’t expect peace talks any time soon.

But there aren’t many chances in football to watch one of the greatest players the game has ever produced reach a milestone like this in real time.

Messi’s first Inter Miami goal came against Cruz Azul. Just over three years later, so did his 100th.

At 39, we’re probably closer to the end than any of us would particularly like to admit. So whether you think he’s the GOAT or just one of them, these are probably the nights worth enjoying while they’re still here.