Lionel Messi faced his childhood club and this is what he said after the match

Inter Miami reached the end of the 2024 preseason. They had a very demanding schedule that included seven friendly matches in five different countries, including a tour in Asia, in which they had many unexpected problems. Not only were the team's performances and the results obtained unsatisfactory, but also several players suffered injuries and Lionel Messi was the unwitting protagonist of a scandal.

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Leo had a muscular problem during the last minutes of the match against Al-Hilal in Saudi Arabia and that prevented him from playing against an all-star team from the Hong Kong league. That made the fans and the organizers of the event angry with him, in a conflict that even affected the Argentine national team. The world champions were supposed to play two friendlies in China during the international break in March, but this situation forced them to cancel them.

Back in the United States, Messi recovered physically and was able to play 60 minutes in the last pre-season friendly. It was this Thursday night at the DRV PNK Stadium in Miami against Newell's Old Boys, the Argentine team he played for before moving to Barcelona at the age of 13 and of which he is still a fan. There he was reunited with a former teammate of his in Argentina, the former Sevilla player Ever Banega, who is the star of the Rosario team.

The match ended in a 1-1 draw thanks to goals by Shanyder Borgelin for the hosts and Franco Diaz for the Argentines. The most important thing for Inter Miami was that Lionel played most of the match and showed no after-effects of his injury. In fact, on more than one occasion he pushed himself to the limit and made the difference with the ball at his feet, so he will surely be in perfect condition for next week's Major League Soccer opener against Real Salt Lake.

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What did he say?

After the match, Newell's players approached Lionel Messi to hug him, take pictures with him and try to take his jersey. And he was not only willing to do so, but later shared an image of the match on his official Instagram account with the message: "A very special match to close the preseason".