The question, which in time has become less of a question and more of a cliche meme, is a variation of Andy Gray’s comment: Sure, Lionel Messi is an all-time great. But can he do it on a cold rainy night in Stoke?
This question is ridiculous and annoying. Of course he can – he’s done it on rainy nights in Fort Lauderdale multiple times in just the last year and half. There are whole compilations of him doing all of his usual Messi things in terrible weather throughout his career. Even the dialog the question/meme supposedly replaces – let’s see if Messi can overcome this piece of weather-based adversity! – seems pointless when the player in question has already, for all intents and purposes, completed football at the highest level.
This week, though, one could be gently forgiven for utilizing an American version of the question in a post, a headline, or as a lighthearted way to make your friends groan. As Messi and Inter Miami prepared to open their 2025 campaign with a visit to Sporting KC in the first round of the Concacaf Champions Cup, it was clear the conditions would be a big part of the story. The temperature in Kansas City dropped to 3F (-16C) on Tuesday, the original date which was delayed due to snowfall. At kickoff on Wednesday night it was only a few degrees warmer, and by the end of the night they hovered at just below 0F (-17C). It was not quite the coldest game at kickoff between MLS teams ever – that would be Colorado’s 2018 Champions Cup game against Toronto FC, clocking in at 3F – but it was close enough.
Could Messi do it on a damn near Siberian night in Kansas City? Of course he could. The Argentinian managed to create the match’s one moment of magic, settling an aerial ball while surrounded by defenders, shifting past those defenders with his signature hypnotic control, and finishing at an acute angle in the second half for the game’s only goal. Miami now take that 1-0 lead back to Fort Lauderdale in the second leg next week, with the hope that players and coaches will have thawed out in time for the team’s MLS opener this weekend v New York City FC.
“For the people who know him, it’s normal,” Inter Miami head coach Javier Mascherano said of Messi’s goal. “He does goals like this all the time.”
Perhaps so, but he’s never been involved in a goal like Wednesday’s. This was the coldest game in which Messi has ever played at senior level – the record low temperature in any country he has played in during his career is far above where it was at kickoff. The Argentinian, like most of his teammates, opponents, and fans in the stands, seemed viscerally uncomfortable for most of the match’s opening stages. Most players wore fleece neck gaiters that were occasionally pulled up over their heads. Marscherano started the game hatless with a vest and undershirt. By midway through the first half, he had a gaiter, a hat, a jacket and an overcoat. At one point, Messi was shown on the broadcast running to the sideline during a break in action, having new hand warmers inserted into his gloves.
“I’ve never been through anything like that,” Mascherano said. “After 10 minutes [the players] couldn’t feel their hands or their feet … I’m very proud of them. It was impossible to play in these conditions. It’s inhumane.”
If the tone of that quote sounds somewhat familiar to your ears at this time of year, you may be a US soccer fan. In each of the past three seasons, an early-season game in a cold-weather location has drawn the ire of at least one coach or player who was willing to speak up about it.
“An absolute joke that we had to play today,” LAFC head coach Steve Cherundolo said last year, when his team played Real Salt Lake in a snowstorm. He later called the game “one of the worst professional sporting events I’ve ever seen in my life,” and was fined for his comments. Cherundolo’s luck didn’t change much this year – LAFC’s Champions Cup loss at Colorado on Tuesday was played in similar conditions as Kansas City on Wednesday: 7F at kickoff.
This type of game has become a fixture on the American soccer calendar. In 2022, the US men’s national team hosted Honduras in a February World Cup qualifier in Saint Paul, Minnesota. The temperature at kickoff was 3F, also reported at -15 F (-26C) with wind chill. Bruce Arena, then coach of New England Revolution, said Matt Turner returned from national team duty with frostbite in his toe.
after newsletter promotion
Later that year, New England lost late to Real Salt Lake amid a snowstorm, prompting one of the more memorable reactions you’re ever likely to see from a player as Carles Gil railed against the decision to play at all.
In 2019, Colorado and Portland played one of the coldest matches in league history, with Timbers midfielder Diego Chará claiming that it took two days for him to feel normal again. And this is to say nothing of the SnowClásico – the United States’ 2013 World Cup qualifier in Colorado v Costa Rica that was played in a driving snowstorm – or the 2013 MLS Cup final, played in a frigid Kansas City with one side of the pitch so frozen that goalkeepers had trouble keeping their footing, or Minnesota United’s very first home game in 2017, beset by a blizzard in a loss to Atlanta United.
At this point, playing through the cold is as endemic to American soccer as the MLS salary budget and constant long-distance travel. Chances are it will only become more common – especially if MLS follows through with its current exploration of switching to a fall-to-spring calendar, which would necessitate either a long winter break or some creative scheduling to get around the cold entirely.
As he so often has, though, Messi laid waste not just a meme but also a train of thought; that the challenges of playing in the United States will trip up even the world’s best players.
“There is one guy that can turn the game over and he did,” said Sporting KC head coach Peter Vermes of Messi. “It’s what he does to the whole world, anyone who plays against him.”
And, indeed, wherever he plays, and whatever the weather is.
Article by:Source: Alexander Abnos
