LA Galaxy vs Inter Miami Odds
| LA Galaxy Odds | +170 |
| Inter Miami Odds | +130 |
| Draw | +300 |
| Over / Under | 3.5 +110 / -150 |
Lionel Messi and Inter Miami try to make it two wins from two matches in the new season when they fly across the country to visit the LA Galaxy in a Sunday evening MLS contest.
Messi assisted one goal and helped set up the other in the Herons' 2-0 home victory over Real Salt Lake to open the season on Wednesday night. But the score flattered Miami, and with more composure and/or better finishing Salt Lake might have taken a share of the points.
The Galaxy have their own FC Barcelona product, former academy charge Riqui Puig, who had seven goals and eight assists in his first full MLS season in 2023. But LA have reached the playoffs only twice since 2017 in what is easily the most fallow stretch in the history of the five-time MLS Cup champions.
This will be Messi's first match against the Galaxy but his second trip to Southern California after he helped Miami to a 3-1 league win over LAFC last season.
Here is my LA Galaxy vs Inter Miami prediction.
LA Galaxy
Puig and manager Greg Vanney were a part of the Galaxy last season, but 2024 feels like the start of a new project at the Los Angeles area's older MLS side.
Javier "Chicharito" Hernandez played out his contract and moved on to finish his career at his boyhood club, Chivas of Guadalajara in Liga MX. And instead of chasing aging headliners like the Galaxy have done since David Beckham first came to MLS, incoming club GM Will Kuntz has been mirroring the strategy of other successful MLS teams in targeting younger, in-their-prime but lesser-known talents in the international market.
Wingers Joseph Paintsill (formerly of Genk) and Gabriel Pec (formerly of Vasco da Gama) are the first such additions to meet that description. Both have been cleared to make their debuts, though either or both could begin the game on the bench because of fitness concerns that generally come with the paperwork process required for new international players. Eventually the aim is for them to complete a front four with Puig at the No. 10 position and Serbian Dejan Joveljic playing the center forward position.
For it to matter, though, LA will have to solve the defensive problems that sabotaged their 2023 season. Vanney's squad conceded an MLS-worst 67 goals last season. To show how bad it got, the Galaxy scored two or more goals 18 times and won only eight of those matches.
Getting better defensively in the short term became more difficult earlier this month when LA lost U.S. National Team center back prospect Jalen Neal for six to eight weeks with an abdominal issue.
Inter Miami
The Herons were dominant in the first half against Salt Lake but appeared to run out of energy very quickly in the second as RSL adjusted by bringing their line of confrontation much higher.
The best way to contain Messi was to prevent him from getting on the ball, and for about a 20- to 25-minute stretch, RSL did that by turning Miami over repeatedly deep in their end. At one point the visitors had six successive shots without reply, but failed to convert any of them and at times also made the wrong decisions in promising positions to bail Miami out.
You knew what was going to happen. Eventually, Messi did get the ball again, made a long foray forward and then found Luis Suarez, who crossed to Diego Gomez for a badly needed 83rd-minute insurance tally.
Miami also benefitted from Zac MacMath's sloppy goalkeeping on Robert Taylor's first goal. But those kinds of mistakes have been the norm from MLS teams that are playing against Messi for the first time.
Suarez played almost the full 90 minutes despite appearing to carry a slight limp for much of the encounter. Of Miami's former FC Barcelona quartet, he might be the most likely to be rotated in favor of Ecuadorean striker Leonardo Campana, who led the side with nine MLS goals last season.
But other reinforcements are also coming, like highly touted 21-year-old defensive midfielder Federico Redondo from Argentinos Juniors, who officially signed with Inter Miami this week but is probably a couple of weeks from suiting up.
LA Galaxy vs Inter Miami
Prediction
Miami manager Tata Martino will probably evaluate the tape from Wednesday's game and conclude he should've turned to his bench sooner.
His starting XI had seven players over age 30 and four over age 34. It had clearly hit a wall and was struggling to cope with RSL's press. And if it happens against more composed sides the Herons will get punished.
But those second-half struggles by their nature also highlight what has been somewhat consistent first-half brilliance.
Messi has now played nine matches as a starter in all competitions against an MLS opponent facing him for the first time. His team has scored the first goal in eight of them.
Part of that, I suspect, is on account of the psychology of opponents trying to mentally process playing against the world's greatest living player. But part of it is the innate familiarity between Messi and his former Barca teammates in particular, who need far less time to work into a rhythm of a match than most players.
Against a team whose key pieces have spent precious little time together, I think it's definitely a trend worth backing here, playing the Herons to score the first goal at -115 odds and an implied 53.5% probability. I'd probably still be betting it if the price was in the -135 to -140 neighborhood.
