{"id":80301,"date":"2026-04-19T22:40:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-19T22:40:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/lionel-messi-fires-inter-miami-to-debut-win-under-new-coach\/"},"modified":"2026-04-19T22:40:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T22:40:57","slug":"lionel-messi-fires-inter-miami-to-debut-win-under-new-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/lionel-messi-fires-inter-miami-to-debut-win-under-new-coach\/","title":{"rendered":"Lionel Messi fires Inter Miami to debut win under new coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"article-meta\"><span class=\"timestamp \">Apr 18, 2026, 09:36 PM ET<\/span><\/div>\n<p>Lionel Messi had two goals, including a stunning 79th-minute winner, to give Inter Miami a victory in new interim coach Guillermo Hoyos&#8217; first match in charge Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>Mexico striker Germ\u00e1n Berterame also scored as Miami beat the Colorado Rapids 3-2 in front of a crowd of 75,824 &#8212; the second-highest attendance in MLS history &#8212; at Empower Field at Mile High.<\/p>\n<p>It was Miami&#8217;s first game since Javier Mascherano stepped down as coach Tuesday, just four months after guiding the club to its first MLS Cup title.<\/p>\n<p>Hoyos, whose relationship with Messi dates back to his time working at Barcelona&#8217;s renowned La Masia academy more than 20 years ago, was put in charge of the first team for &#8220;the upcoming matches,&#8221; moving over from his current role of sporting director.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It has been a beautiful experience because there are players of immense quality here including the greatest player in history,&#8221; Hoyos said in a news conference.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I was excited on many occasions, because football truly is all about that emotion and passion.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Messi opened the scoring when he converted a penalty kick in the 13th minute, before his late go-ahead goal. After a Colorado turnover near midfield, Messi cut back near the right corner of the penalty box and struck a rising shot that split a pair of defenders and slipped inside the back post.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0418%2Fr1645669_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=570&amp;format=jpg, https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0418%2Fr1645669_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=1140&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0418%2Fr1645669_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=375, https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0418%2Fr1645669_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=750&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Lionel Messi celebrates scoring the first of his two goals in Inter Miami&#8217;s win over the Colorado Rapids.\u00a0<cite>Jamie Schwaberow\/MLS via Getty Images<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Messi has seven goals this season, tied with Sam Surridge and Petar Musa for most in MLS.<\/p>\n<p>Asked how he approaches coaching his fellow Argentine and the record eight-time Ballon d&#8217;Or winner, Hoyos responded: &#8220;The best coach in the world is actually out there on the pitch. We coaches are merely guides.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Miami (4-1-3) is now seven games unbeaten and hasn&#8217;t lost since a season-opening 3-0 defeat to LAFC.<\/p>\n<p>Miami midfielder Yannick Bright was shown a straight red card in the 87th minute for using &#8220;offensive, insulting, abusive language heard by the referee,&#8221; the Professional Referee Organization, which oversees MLS referees, confirmed to ESPN. According to the PRO pool report, Bright used the phrase b&#8212;- ass n&#8212;a.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Honestly, I don&#8217;t know, and I was certainly surprised, by the sending off,&#8221; Hoyos said when asked about the reason for the expulsion.<\/p>\n<p>Bright drew a penalty conceded by Joshua Atencio, and Messi converted from the spot to open the scoring.<\/p>\n<p>Mateo Silvetti, along the right end line, played an arcing cross to the back post, where Berterame slammed home a header to make it 2-0 in the fifth minute of first-half stoppage time.<\/p>\n<p>Berterame scored his first MLS goal last time out in a 2-2 tie with the New York Red Bulls.<\/p>\n<p>Rafael Navarro scored in the 58th minute for the Rapids. The 26-year-old forward scored two goals in last week&#8217;s 6-2 win over Houston and has six goals this season.<\/p>\n<p>Darren Yapi subbed on for Hamzat Ojediran and, moments later, scored on the counterattack to make it 2-2 in the 62nd minute.<\/p>\n<p><em>ESPN&#8217;s Lizzy Becherano and The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Apr 18, 2026, 09:36 PM ET Lionel Messi had two goals, including a stunning 79th-minute winner, to give Inter Miami a victory in new interim coach Guillermo Hoyos&#8217; first match in charge Saturday. Mexico striker Germ\u00e1n Berterame also scored as Miami beat the Colorado Rapids 3-2 in front of a crowd of 75,824 &#8212; the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":80302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_daextam_enable_autolinks":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-80301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football-transfers"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/r1645669_1296x729_16-9.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80301","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80301"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80301\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/80302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}