Barely half a week after his final night in Argentina colours, Lionel Messi was back hunting goals in pink and black. Inter Miami dismantled D.C. United 4-0 at Nu Stadium on Saturday, Messi and Luis Suárez sharing the scoring with two apiece while Germán Berterame set up a pair. The captain lasted the full evening.
The hosts needed only three minutes. Sergio Reguilón swung a ball in from the left, Berterame nodded it on, and Suárez swept a left-foot finish for league goal fourteen. Around the quarter-hour mark, Miami’s keeper Dayne St. Clair threw himself across goal to smother a chance from Tai Baribo. Just before the interval Berterame headed again and Suárez poked home number fifteen on the year.
After the break the Argentine took over. In the 47th minute Suárez cut the ball back from the left and Messi steered in season goal twenty-two. On the hour Rodrigo De Paul slipped him through the middle; Messi ghosted past a pair of markers and rolled the ball into the far corner for twenty-three, opening a four-goal cushion on Dallas’s Petar Musa in the Golden Boot race.
The result snapped a five-game MLS drought — four draws and one defeat — and handed Cristian “Kily” González his first league win since he arrived on 16 September. Miami had not tasted victory since thrashing Montreal 7-1 at the end of August. Their ledger against D.C. United now reads seven unbeaten: five wins, two draws.
With 49 points Miami cling to second in the East, fourteen behind Nashville, and welcome New York City FC on Wednesday. D.C. United’s own five-match barren run continues as the playoff math gets less forgiving.
