Lionel Messi, Inter Miami battle fatigue ahead of Chicago Fire match Tuesday
Javier Mascherano knew this day would come.
The Inter Miami coach realized fatigue would eventually set in as his team, with the most congested and taxing schedule, by far, in Major League Soccer, prepares to play its 54th game of the year Tuesday night against the Chicago Fire.
Eager to expand its global brand with iconic captain Lionel Messi as the front man, Inter Miami began 2025 with preseason games in Las Vegas, Peru, Panama, Honduras and Tampa. Then, intertwined among its MLS schedule were appearances in the Concacaf Champions Cup, the Club World Cup and the Leagues Cup.
Messi and his teammates reached the semifinals of the Champions Cup, the knockout stage of the Club World Cup and the final of the Leagues Cup. In fact, Tuesday’s home game against the Fire was supposed to be played in August but was rescheduled due to Miami’s participation in the Leagues Cup final.
Now, running on fumes after five games in the past 15 days, Mascherano’s team heads into a critical four-game stretch to end the regular season.
Inter Miami has booked a playoff spot but slipped to fourth place in the Eastern Conference with a 1-1 tie against Toronto on Saturday. Messi, who leads the Golden Boot race with 24 goals in 24 games, was held scoreless against Toronto.
Although Miami has two games in hand over the three teams ahead in the table, it cannot afford to drop many more points to stay in the top four and secure home-field advantage in the playoffs.
Asked how the team is dealing with fatigue, Mascherano smiled and replied: “If anyone has a recipe, let me know.”
Then, he explained the challenges he and his staff are facing. With less than 72 hours between games, and key players such as Messi, Luis Suarez, Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba in their mid-to-late 30s, Monday’s training session was lighter than usual so players could recover.
“We will try to keep managing the best we can while remaining as competitive as we can because we want to finish as high as we can in the standings,” Mascherano said. “We knew this day would come. We are going through this because we reached the final stages of the tournaments we played, unfortunately, we did not win. It’s not easy, especially at this stage of the season. We have played 48 official games, which is crazy.”
Having failed to win any of the three trophies the team played for so far this year, Inter Miami is highly motivated to repeat as Supporters’ Shield champions and win the first MLS Cup in club history.
Tuesday’s game will not be easy. The resurgent Fire, under coach Gregg Berhalter, also has a lot to play for. Chicago is coming off back-to-back shutout wins (3-0 over Minnesota, 2-0 over the Columbus Crew) and can clinch its first playoff berth since 2017 with a victory against Inter Miami.
“Chicago is in a good stretch right now, they have won home and away and are coming off a win over Columbus in which they played very well and could have won by more goals,” Mascherano said.
“They created a lot of chances and have changed how they play, using a five-man line [of defense], though they will be without [Sam] Rogers [suspended for yellow card accumulation] so we don’t know if they will stick with five or go with a four-man line. We will prepare for both.”
Belgian forward Hugo Cuypers leads Chicago with 17 goals this season. Other Fire players to watch include Jonathan Bamba (Ivory Coast), Andre Gutman (USA), Andre Franco (Portugal), and Philip Zinckernagel (Denmark), who has scored five goals in the past 10 games.
Mascherano was asked to assess Inter Miami’s defense, which has conceded 47 goals, which is among the most in the conference.
“The talk all season has been on the topic of our defense, but the way I see it, the other day [against Toronto] we did not defend poorly as a team,” he said. “We had 15 minutes where we lost our focus and composure, and they generated two or three chances. I saw the goal they scored as more of an accident, rather than poor defending.
“That said, a common denominator has been that opponents hurt us in transition, and that is part of the characteristics of the team we have and how we play.”
Inter Miami forward Allen Obando rejoined the team in full training after months recovering from a hamstring injury. He trained last week with the second team while the first team was traveling, and Mascherano said it remains to be seen whether he will be ready for the game against Chicago.
How to Watch: Inter Miami and the Chicago Fire kick off at 7:30 p.m. at Chase Stadium in Fort Lauderdale. The game will air on Apple TV MLS Season Pass. Tickets are available at intermiamicf.com/tickets
This story was originally published September 29, 2025 at 3:55 PM.