No Messi, no problem: Luis Suarez is turning the clock back to 2014 at Inter Miami
It’s been a hot minute since Lionel Messi, Neymar, and Luis Suarez came together to create the sort of divine footballing alchemy the world hasn’t seen since you and your two pals from Set 2 Maths dominated the school yard scene in year 9.
It’s been even longer since Suarez and Daniel Sturridge formed the SAS at Liverpool, and the Uruguayan made a hobby of terrorising the city of Norwich on an annual basis. But Inter Miami are getting a tantalising glimpse of the old El Pistolero.
Inter Miami were playing FC Cincinnati in MLS on Sunday, down in the stifling heat of Fort Lauderdale. Miami are currently without the injured Lionel Messi, and they’ve got Sergio Busquets playing centre-back.
Interestingly, Federico Redondo is playing the classic Busquets role, and if that surname sounds familiar to you, your instincts are correct—he is the son of Real Madrid legend Fernando Redondo, the year 2000 Champions League MVP, and the man about whom Alex Ferguson once asked, “What does this player have in his boots? A magnet?”
That wouldn’t be useful unless they were playing with a magnetic ball, but we digress…
Messi may have been missing, but his old mucker Luis Suarez stepped up to the plate once more, scoring a brace inside the first six minutes against Cincinnati.
The first one is vintage Suarez. A Marcelo Weigandt cross comes into the box from the right, but it’s just behind the intended target.
Obviously, Suarez has read the situation before it’s even happened, positioned himself right where the ball ends up, just left of the penalty spot, chests it down, and fires into the bottom left corner with accuracy and venom.
The second is a little more fortunate. They don’t mention it in the commentary but it takes a crucial deflection that wrong-foot’s the goalkeeper.
That’s not the talking point here, though. The talking point is the defending. Jesus Christ, what is going on in that Cincinnati midfield and backline?
First of all, what the bloody hell is Obinna Nwobodo doing? Running towards his own goal, plays a suicidal pass vaguely in the general direction of Cincinnati centre-back Miles Robinson, it’s intercepted easily by Matias Rojas, who plays a quick one-two with Suarez.
Chiwozie Awaziem’s got his hand up for offside, despite both he and Robinson clearly playing the Uruguayan onside.
Rojas plays it round the corner for Suarez, who shoots first time, and the ball flies past Roman Celentano in goal, via a deflection from the lunging aforementioned Awaziem.
Absolute chaos. We don’t want to point fingers, but Obinna Nwobodo must have been dreading facing his teammates and coach at half-time.
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It’s just as well Suarez struck so early, because Miami were down to ten men before half-time. The Herons’ 20-year-old centre-back Tomas Aviles got himself sent off for a second yellow that could’ve just as easily been a straight red.
Despite that, Suarez who played 86 minutes at the age of 37, and his fellow ex-Barca veterans—Busquets and Jordi Alba (who played the full game) hung on to their lead and kept a clean sheet.
Suarez took a couple of games to find his feet in the United States, after a season with Gremio in Brazil, during which he notched 29 goals in all competitions and was elected the league’s best player.
When he did, though, it was special. Back in April, the Guardian wrote about the Uruguayan:
“Messi is the reigning FIFA Best award winner, but there is now a reasonable debate to be had over whether he is even the best player on his own team this season.”
El Pistolero isn’t in MLS for a holiday or a retirement party, though—far from it. He’s there for silverware. He’s shown the same grit and borderline horribleness that has always set him apart from other strikers. Well, maybe not quite the same horribleness but that’s a good thing.
He told reporters in an unveiling press conference:
“The best word we players have to have is to dream: dreaming big. To dream is to want to win. Why not dream of winning the four titles?”
They’ll have to manage his minutes, and manager Tata Martino knows that. But if Suarez is this hungry for titles, and with Messi due back from injury anytime now, the rest of Major League Soccer should be quaking, because they’re not going to be stopped easily.
By Andrew Martin