Lionel Messi scored an amazing hat trick to win Major League Soccer’s Golden Boot award yesterday. Inter Miami won 5-2 over Nashville SC to move on to the playoffs.
The Argentine superstar scored an incredible 29 goals in 28 games. Denis Bouanga of Los Angeles FC and Sam Surridge of Nashville were tied for second highest with 24 goals.
Messi won his first MLS Golden Boot and also made a case for winning the Most Valuable Player award for the second year in a row with a great performance that helped Inter win third place in the Eastern Conference.
The MLS Cup playoffs began on October 24, and they will play the same Nashville club in the first round.
“What can I say about Leo?” Javier Mascherano, the coach of Inter, remarked.
“Today, he was great, as he usually is.” He has clearly shown that he deserves the Most Valuable Player honor.
“I’m glad for him because he helped us win the game again.”
Nashville had missed some good chances until Messi scored a great goal from outside the penalty area in the 34th minute to put Miami ahead.
Messi got a feed from Jordi Alba, made one move, and then shot with his left foot into the bottom left corner.
Nine minutes later, Nashville’s Surridge scored his 24th goal of the season by heading in a perfect pass from Hany Mukhtar at the near post.
Nashville took a 2-1 lead deep into the first half of injury time when Jacob Shaffelburg scored off a rebound from a Mukhtar shot that hit the post.
In the 63rd minute, Messi scored his first penalty of the season to tie the game for Inter.
Luis Suarez’s shot touched Mukhtar on the arm, and the referee pointed to the spot.
Messi stepped up and rolled it past Joe Willis, the Nashville keeper.
In the 67th minute, Baltasar Rodriguez made it 3-2 for Miami. In the 81st minute, Messi scored his third goal with a looping shot through traffic that went past Willis.
In the second half of injury time, Miami’s Telasco Segovia scored the last goal against a Nashville team that was still in disbelief.
– Very good level –
Mascherano observed, “It was very hard for us in the first half because we weren’t focused.”
“We played really defensively, and we didn’t have many ideas with the ball either.
“The second half was not the same. We played in the other team’s half, took more chances, and finished at a high level.
There was a lot on the line in the last games of the season in the Western Conference.
San Diego FC, an expansion team, beat Thomas Mueller’s Vancouver Whitecaps for the top seed in the West. They won 4-0 over the Portland Timbers, and Vancouver lost 2-1 to Dallas, leaving them both with 63 points.
San Diego’s Amahl Pellegrino and Anders Dreyer each scored two goals, and the team won the conference on a tiebreaker to have the best regular season for a first-year team in MLS history.
Dallas, one of four clubs fighting for the remaining two postseason spots in the Western Conference, won in Vancouver thanks to goals from Osaze Urhoghide and Kaick.
Mueller scored a penalty, but the Whitecaps only had 10 players for most of the game since Mathias Laborda was sent out in the 11th minute.
The opening round of the playoffs will see Dallas and Vancouver play each other again.
Real Salt Lake also made it to the playoffs after drawing 2-2 with St. Louis and Colorado drawing 2-2 with Los Angeles FC.
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