Inter Miami winning streak, Messi scoring surge halted emphatically by Cincinnati
Lionel Messi was on a historic scoring streak, which had helped Inter Miami become the hottest team in Major League Soccer.
They were made to look anything but that on Wednesday night against a fellow MLS Cup contender in FC Cincinnati.
Messi, who had become the first MLS player to score multiple goals in five consecutive league games, was held scoreless.
And Inter Miami, which had begun an impressive climb up the MLS standings with five consecutive league wins and six consecutive league games without a loss, saw that streak ended emphatically after an ugly 3-0 loss at TQL Stadium in Cincinnati.
“Clearly, we were outplayed from the beginning of the match,” Inter Miami coach Javier Mascherano said after the game. “One of the reasons could be because we’ve been dealing with a big workload, playing several matches in a short amount of time. But regardless, we just didn’t play the type of match we wanted.
“We weren’t fresh and we weren’t lucid out there and they outplayed us.”
A capacity crowd of 25,513, most of which wore the colors of the home side, took part in a “Blue Out,” although some pink Inter Miami jerseys were spotted sporadically in the stands.
Cincinnati’s supporters left the happiest after watching their side dominate and pick up a key three points to push itself to 45 points for the season.
Miami (11-4-5, 38 points) remained in fifth place in the Eastern Conference, but missed out on a chance to close the gap, and is now seven points behind Cincinnati. The teams will face each other again on July 26 at Chase Stadium in Fort Lauderdale.
Inter Miami, which will next play at the New York Red Bulls on Saturday, played its eighth match in the past 33 days and the Barcelona Four of Messi, Luis Suarez, Jordi Alba and Sergio Busquets all played the entire match on Wednesday. The team will also travel directly from Cincinnati to New Jersey to prepare for Saturday’s match.
“It’s obviously worrisome when one of your rivals beats you, especially the way they beat us tonight,” Mascherano said. “But you have to turn the page and look at Saturday and rest and recuperate your energy for New York.”
Miami fell behind after 16 minutes when Gerardo Valenzuela struck first, and Brazilian star Evander followed with a pair of second half goals to break the game open.
Miami trailed in a match for the first time since resuming league play following its Round of 16 finish in the FIFA Club World Cup against Paris St.-Germain on June 29.
Things got worse for Inter Miami in the first half when goalkeeper Oscar Ustari exited the game in the 25th minute due to injury. Rocco Rios Novo replaced Ustari in goal.
Ustari, who had dealt with a shoulder issue earlier this month, appeared to pull up and was slightly limping after clearing a ball with his left foot. Ustari sat for a few moments on the field and was treated by team trainers before exiting the match.
Miami controlled possession 54.2 percent to 46.8 percent. But Cincinnati outshot Miami 7-2 on shots on target. At many points during the match, Cincinnati players appeared a step quicker to the ball and made plays before Miami could recover.
Mascherano acknowledged after the game that Miami’s busy schedule coming off the Club World Cup could be playing a role in the team’s overall fatigue and its string of muscle-related injuries.
Yannick Bright (hamstring) and Gonzalo Lujan (hamstring) each returned to action off the bench on Wednesday, but David Ruiz (hamstring) did not despite being listed as available. Noah Allen (hamstring), Allen Obando (hamstring), Ian Fray (adductor), Baltasar Rodriguez (hamstring) and Drake Callender (hernia) were all out.
Federico Redondo was dealing with a fever since Tuesday night, which led to him not playing on Wednesday, according to Mascherano.
“I’m not the ideal person to ask why we keep dealing with so many muscle-related injuries, but we’ve clearly played a lot of games especially in the past month and a half against high-level competition,” Mascherano said. “We have to find a way to deal with that better and find a way to move forward.”
On Cincinnati’s first goal, Luca Orellano drove the ball into Inter Miami’s zone and split through two defenders. He then fired the ball ahead to Valenzuela, who then turned a fired a left-footed shot past Ustari.
Cincinnati’s second goal came in the 50th minute when Benja Cremaschi and Busquets each failed to clear a cross from Cincinnati midfielder Pavel Bucha to Evander, who controlled the ball and fired it past Rios Novo in the 50th minute.
Evander added a third goal in the 70th minute when Rios Novo stopped a shot by Orellano, but Evander tapped home a rebound.
Cincinnati (14-6-3) bounced back after suffering a 4-2 loss at home this past Saturday against the Columbus Crew.
Inter Miami lost an MLS match for the first time since May 18 when it suffered a similarly lopsided 3-0 loss against Orlando City.
Messi failed to score for the first time in seven league matches and couldn’t come up with his first career goal against Cincinnati.
Two of his best chances came just before halftime. First, Messi collected a crossing header from Busquets in front of the goal. But his attempt was deflected away by Cincinnati defender Lukas Engel.
Messi had an even better chance again on a shot from close range in the final minute of first half stoppage time, but it was smothered by goalkeeper Roman Celentano.
“We have to find a way to rest and still compete and win. There’s no secret formula for that,” Mascherano said. “We’ll keep going from match to match trying to go out there with the best and healthiest team possible. Next will be to obtain those three points against New York and hopefully get more of our injured players healthy.”
▪ Miami’s starting lineup had one change from its previous match on the back end where Tomas Aviles started in place of David Martinez.
This story was originally published July 16, 2025 at 6:54 PM.
