Lionel Messi Eyes Inter Miami Fitness And Argentina Success

A Big 2025 Waits For Lionel Messi

Inter Miami will start their MLS season on February 22nd against New York City F.C, as Lionel Messi moves into his third decade as a professional soccer player.

The 37 year-old that made his Barcelona first-team debut in 2004 will captain Inter Miami at the FIFA 2025 Club World Cup in the U.S.A this June. He will also captain his nation in FIFA 2026 World Cup qualifiers, but will he be around the following summer to compete at the biggest competition in global sports?

Lionel Messi has made three friendly appearance for Inter Miami so far this calendar year. The Argentine dynamo has partnered his old pal Luis Suarez at the front of the Florida club’s line-up in each game. Messi is finding his feet in the new year and looking to build up some fitness and form ahead of what is certainly his last ever World Cup campaign.

Whether Lionel will make it all the way and still be captain of the Argentina team next summer remains a mystery. In 2024 we saw a natural ageing process of the superstar that led Argentina to World Cup glory in 2022. Moments of brilliance were still there, but generally Messi was doing less on the pitch in an “easier” league. The number 10 even cut a frustrated figure at times, for both club and country, when it was evident that his body wouldn’t quite give him what his mind wanted.

Magic Messi Can Still Make The Difference

Having said that, those aforementioned moments do still exist. The spark of magic seems not to have faded. It may be less potent against stronger opposition, and it may be more sporadic, but the spark is certainly still there. The argument remains that as long as Lionel Messi has his brain and his left foot then he can still make an impact and pull the strings for Argentina next summer.

Whether Messi has the form, fitness and desire to give us, football fans and followers, the joy of seeing him in what would be a record sixth World Cup, is another thing. Messi has won it all and has nothing left to prove. Perhaps he will simply decide that his time is up before then, but there is clearly a large part of him that wants to be there. You can see it during his Argentina performances, on the good or bad days, the desire is definitely there.

In March, he will captain Argentina in two huge international derby games, both against neighbours and historic rivals; Uruguay and Brazil. Messi and his team will travel to Montevideo to face a spirited and youthful ‘Celeste’ side. It is a team packed with energy that has already defeated Argentina in this campaign. Then Messi and company will welcome old foes Brazil to the Estadio Monumental in Buenos Aires, in one of world football’s most romantic and iconic fixtures.

Fitness Is Key For Messi

These two games, perhaps more than any inter Miami outing, will be a real test of where Lionel Messi’s form and fitness are. In the last international break Messi provided an assist out of nothing as Argentina defeated Peru 1-0 at home. Yet, apart from that moment he had an eerily quiet game, and that followed a horrific performance by Argentina in Paraguay, where again the captain failed to have a great impact on the match.

Like at PSG before the 2022 World Cup, albeit he was a bit younger then, Lionel Messi will manage his minutes at Miami in order to place himself in the best position to perform for Argentina on the international stage. We know where his true passion and purpose falls and that is as captain of Argentina.

A Legendary Captain

The World Cup winning captain has 112 goals for his country, but he turns 38 this summer and will turn 39 during next year’s World Cup. Perhaps only Dino Zoff has made such an impact at a World Cup with 39 years of age when he won it with Italy, but of course age isn’t so cruel on a goalkeeper.

Then again, when you consider that Diego Maradona played his last World Cup in 1994 at 33 years of age, and that the great Mario Kempes only ever played in the 1978 tournament in which he helped Argentina to their first title, we should be grateful with what Messi has already done for the game on the biggest stage there is.

Such is his magnetism and otherworldly ability to manipulate a football, we have been spoiled rotten for years. Not little after he lifted the World Cup trophy in Qatar he was already being pressured with the question of whether his future self would still be kicking for the next tournament. It’s tough at the top.

The next six months will tell us a lot about where Lionel Messi is at, somewhere along the line in the twilight of his career of course, but where exactly? In what shape? Will he show us that the magic moments are still there in the biggest of games, or will he finally slide away from the limelight?