Defensive miscues hurt Inter Miami in lopsided season-opening loss to LAFC
It had the star power and spectacle you expected.
It drew a crowd of 75,673, which set a record for attendance at a Major League Soccer regular-season opener, and was the second-largest ever in an MLS game.
The highly-anticipated matchup between Lionel Messi’s reigning MLS Cup champion Inter Miami and Korean superstar Son Heung-Min’s LAFC had the feel of a championship match inside a loud and filled Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum despite being played on the first matchday of the league’s 31st season.
But only one side dominated the match itself.
Much to the delight of the majority of the crowd clad in black and gold, that victor was LAFC, which capitalized on an often out-of-sorts Inter Miami defense to secure a 3-0 victory and three points to kick off a season of high expectations for both sides.
“It’s difficult analyzing the game when you lose by three goals, but the feeling I get is that this was a result that’s a bit deceiving,” Inter Miami coach Javier Mascherano said. “The way the game played out, there wasn’t that huge of a difference like the result would indicate, but clearly LAFC has made the difference when it came to attacks in transition. I thought in the second half, we had much better control, and we had chances in the first 25 or so minutes to tie the game.
“We don’t go crazy when we win, and we don’t make it a tragedy when we lose. We move forward and correct the mistakes we made and stay positive.”
Son did not score any of those goals, but assisted on the first on a brilliant feed to David Martinez in the 38th minute. The home side then added a second when its other superstar, Denis Buoanga, found the back of the net in the 73rd minute.
Bouanga then picked up the assist on the third in the 94th minute when he delivered a pass to Nathan Ordaz, who tapped it past St. Clair at close range.
Son, the former captain of Tottenham Hotspur, frequently found his way deep into Inter Miami’s defense and created chances during a first half in which LAFC outshot Messi’s crew, 11-3 and 4-1 in shots on goal.
Martinez broke the stalemate as a result of a giveaway by Inter Miami’s Rodrigo De Paul near midfield when Timothy Tillman poked the ball away from him and to Stephen Eustaquio. The latter then fed the ball ahead to Son, who found Martinez on the run. Martinez then angled the ball to the far corner and out of the reach of goalkeeper Dayne St. Clair, who made his club debut.
St. Clair was tested immediately in the sixth minute when Son got past Miami’s defense. St. Clair challenged, forcing Son wide, but he found Bouanga, who took a point-blank shot, that St. Clair blocked.
But St. Clair, last year’s MLS Goalkeeper of the Year while playing for Minnesota United, made a costly miscue that led to the second goal.
LAFC capitalized again on Inter Miami’s poor defensive posture when Tillman lobbed a long ball downfield to Buoanga as St. Clair was caught off his line in front of the goal. Buoanga then front flipped it past him to give his side a commanding 2-0 edge.
“I don’t like evaluating players individually especially in defeat,” Mascherano said. “I’m the only one responsible for the loss, but with the mindset that there are things that can be fixed. We’ll do the individual evaluations in-house and that’s it.”
Martinez nearly had a second goal in the sixth minute of first-half stoppage time but missed just wide of the goal on a wide open rush downfield. Messi nearly leveled the match a minute later when he found space in front of the goal, turned, and fired a shot wide.
Messi had another strong chance early in the second half, which missed high and wide and appeared visibly frustrated at the end of the match. Video footage surfaced after the match that showed Messi following the officials into a room before being restrained by teammate Luis Suarez.
Mascherano said after the match he was not aware of what transpired.
“I didn’t see anything. The game ended, and I went to the locker room,” Mascherano said.
Miami flipped LAFC’s marked shot advantage through the first 28 minutes of the second half, but chances by Messi and German Berterame, one of Miami’s other major offseason acquisitions who made his debut on Saturday, didn’t find the mark. Buoanga’s goal was LAFC’s first shot on goal of the second half to that point.
LAFC finished with a 16-12 shot advantage for the match, including a 6-3 edge in shots on goal. Miami fell despite a 63.2% to 36.8% advantage in possession.
Berterame delivered a header that barely missed wide on the near post after a great cross from Facundo Mura in the 64th minute. It was one of Inter Miami’s best chances of the match.
But for most of the contest, Inter Miami looked like a team that has not yet had much time to fully incorporate its newest players into a squad that said goodbye to retired stars Jordi Alba and Sergio Busquets after last season.
Inter Miami played three exhibition contests prior to its trip to L.A., but several players including Berterame, who have been unavailable for training sessions due to visa issues, limiting the team’s ability to gel as a squad. Tadeo Allende, one of the stars of last year’s MLS Cup championship run, is another one of those key players that has yet to have significant reps with the club so far. Allende did not start on Saturday, but entered the game in the 68th minute.
Inter Miami returns to action on Thursday in a match against Independiente del Valle in Bayamon, Puerto Rico in an exhibition game that was postponed on Feb. 13 in the wake of Messi’s hamstring injury. The club will then play its second of five consecutive MLS league matches at Orlando on March 1.
“I thought the club had moments where we controlled the game, but we lacked moments where we needed to be sharper in the final third, but in the end LAFC did that better,” Mascherano said. “There are some positives even in defeat, which sounds odd after a loss like this. We just have to continue.”
This story was originally published February 21, 2026 at 9:23 PM.
