Original subtitles

Finally, the other clear question, after knowing that you will not go back to

Barcelona, where do you go?

To Arabia, which you have also said, to Miami?

No,

I made the decision that I will go to Miami.

I still don't have it closed 100%, there are still some things missing, but we

decided to continue the road today.

It's officially official.

Signed today, Lionel Messi.

Enter Miami.

He's in Major League Soccer.

The city is paralyzed. Everyone is talking about Messi. There's pink

around. It's the biggest athletic...

signing in any sport in U .S. history for me. This will forever change the

of soccer in North America.

It had been a long process to get this thing off and running. Being the last

place team in the Eastern Conference. 1 .2 billion from Saudi Arabia.

When does an athlete in any sport have really the opportunity to change the

sport? Beckham, the Moth Brothers all said, we want to bring the best players,

not just in this league, in the world to Miami. And they've done it. We are

feeling the magnitude of this moment already.

The arrival of Lionel Messi has the city of Miami buzzing.

The goat is here. The one thing that we love about the goat is he does his own

grocery shopping. Love it.

It's madness.

With the cameras, the microphones, I mean, people trying to push their way

Everyone wanting to get a glimpse, like people are posing as media members.

I mean, I was shocked. Everybody was shocked. I'm pretty sure MLS and Inter

Miami found his announcement surprising.

He just kind of went out there and did it. That stadium was totally packed.

Tickets sold out in ten minutes. One guy has single -handedly flipped the

league, the world, on fire.

Messi!

Today a new journey and a new chapter starts. There will always be a before

after Leonel Messi.

There was lightning striking about 10 miles outside the stadium.

Oh, God. You know, like, what do we do now, you know?

With this, you know, very nice, but clearly a very

modular, temporary stadium.

It's just the sort of confluence of things that made the entire day, if

honestly, a little surreal.

Major League Soccer really hadn't done an unveiling of this level for lightning

and thunder and the wind and the rain.

to come in 20 minutes before the world's going to see Lionel Messi in Miami.

Todos estábamos un poco preocupados de qué iba a poder hacer y a qué hora iba a

comenzar y todo lo demás, la lluvia. Y el escenario estaba súper mojado y

organizadores que estaban con una toalla escondidos al lado del stage tratando

de limpiar con una toalla.

La gente que producía el evento nos advirtió que no camináramos hasta la

que originalmente estaba...

You're talking about the greatest of all time walking onto a stage. He's going

to slip.

The anxiety was there. The

excitement was there. To really have a belief that Messi was still going to

and that this would be their birth, for lack of a better word.

Y la gente se quedó. La gente estuvo una hora mojándose. Ya la gente no le

importó. La gente quería estar ahí. La gente quería aplaudirlo. La gente quería

celebrar este nuevo comienzo del Inter Miami.

En ningún momento paró de bailar, de cantar, de corear el nombre de Messi. La

energía que había en ese recinto durante todo el evento, incluso horas antes,

era increíble.

Porque el motivo, el motivo era lo que valía la pena y no importaba otra cosa

que... to receive it, to show him the affection, to show him that welcome

aspect was very important so that he would not doubt

what he had done, that he was going to have that place where he was going to be

received with open arms and with a lot of joy and with a lot of energy and that

the weather did not affect anything.

Messi's coming.

I would like to introduce to you your number 10,

Inter -Miami's number 10, America's number 10, The best number

10 in the world, Lionel Andres Messi!

Well, first of all, I want to thank all the people of Miami for this reception,

this affection that I have here in the city.

The truth is that I am very excited, very happy to be here in Miami

and to be with you.

I really want to start training, to start competing.

I come with the desire that I always had to compete, to want.

I'm very happy to have chosen to come to this city with my family, to have

chosen this project.

And I have no doubt that we are going to enjoy it a lot, we are going to have a

good time.

And well, have a great time. Thank you very much. Thank you very much to

everyone for this day.

If I have the skin of a chicken, what can Lionel Messi feel at this moment?

We are talking about a moment that surely, when we remember it, 10, 20

after it happened, I think it will be a moment that changed the history of the

league and the history of football in the United States.

I mean, the unveiling is going to be remembered for so many interesting

but especially they introduced the greatest of all time to Major League

On the field, I didn't know what to expect. I don't know that anybody did.

The wonder of what it was going to be like. The wonder of how long it would

him to acclimate. What would his impact be right away?

Still in

disbelief. And I think kind of everybody was.

The amount of media there, outlets from all over the world for the 15 minutes

allotted us.

At opening training.

It very much felt like an event.

There were probably at least 300 fans in the parking lot sitting on the ground

along the fence trying to kind of like see.

Yeah,

this is it. This is happening. This is here. This is everything.

This is Lionel Messi in Major League Soccer. But I don't think anyone could

ever imagined that we'd be here at this level.

David Beckham spoke about coming to Major League Soccer and needing to

and needing to get the right pieces around him. You've got to have the

flexibility to pull it off. You knew if Lionel Messi's going to come, well,

Busquets is going to be part of that equation.

Leo and Sergio arrived.

They both walked up.

were shaking everybody's hands, and they're like, Kamal, oh, wait, you're

here to Miami as well. You just came here from Montreal.

Like, they came in having their research done. They knew their teammates. They

knew how they could have the best impact.

The way in which he interacts with the young players, like, goes out of his

way to talk to players. And how cool is it to not only get to play, but to learn

from him?

He is easily one of the best athletes I've ever seen in the sense of

understanding his surroundings and understanding in the moment what those

surroundings mean. And I promise you that he's not done.

He's not done.

And look, we're here talking about Lionel Messi, who is not here to retire,

right? And he's not here to ride off into the sunset. He's here to win. He's

here to play at his best and highest level.

At 36 to come into this league, to have the worst team in the league.

In that moment, the line of expectation gets higher and higher. All the pressure

in the world, and especially in this league, is on his shoulders. That's

extremely difficult to fathom.

You don't know what's going to happen.

But also, how cool is that?

Just the atmosphere of the fans, the family atmosphere, the football

it was something different.

And that shows how a person can completely change the spirit and the

Many fans have always dreamed of traveling to Europe, traveling to

the moment in which Messi played with Barcelona.

And no one wants to miss this Messi party.

The broadcast was much bigger than the other broadcasts we had done.

We were putting a lot of resources into the production of the broadcast, the

full, big game shoot. I felt like I was walking into a movie set, almost,

honestly, like with all of the people, all of the extras, to look to my left

see LeBron James.

standing right next to miami's bench to see kim kardashian come out with her son

serena williams walk out and sit down i haven't had many moments in my career

where i've been starstruck per se but that was a moment where i was like oh

this is actually a really big deal

it's

bizarre to be with them eight feet of them sometimes because of his profile.

Messi is here finally, but now they're the game to

be played. So can they make sure that they come out and manage this game in

right way?

We will wait for the debut of Lionel Messi tonight.

You get to watch him be so glued to every moment.

This is an ultra calendar.

Second save in the first four minutes. This one better than the first.

The truth is that Cruz Azul deserved to win.

Carlos Rotundi cutting it back.

Rotundi curling it off the post.

It was awkward. Ian Flay is down in a ton of pain. A difficult fight for the

-year -old. You knew that Lionel Messi was going to come in.

Taylor.

Taylor! Oh, again!

Robert Taylor with a goal!

It's a Miami lead, 1 -0!

First 25 minutes, they were chasing the game.

Easily could have been down a goal or two. They're not. They're going into

halftime. This may be the most watched 15 minutes of halftime on the field in

MLS history.

But there was nothing like when he stood up.

to get ready to go warm up, and the, like, almost, like, deep breath, and

the reaction to the crowd.

I'm warming up now, walking to warm up, and you can hear the crowd chanting

Hitman.

Everyone's just hyper focused on when this is going to happen.

messy. Getting ready to enter for Inter -Miami.

To finally get the recognition that David Beckham and the Moss family worked

really hard for to get to this point.

Holy crap, we pulled this off.

Here we go. The Inter -Miami debut.

Of the greatest of all time, Lionel Messi, the moment is here.

Substituting for Interminable CF, please welcome the world's number 10, and now

your number 10, La Familia. Please welcome to the pitch, number 10, Lionel

Messi.

The feeling that went out, the sound that went out, the appreciation for him

choosing to come play here.

He's still the greatest player in the world. And now he's doing it in an inter

-Miami jersey.

Santana Gamboa in Tijuana.

And here he is for the first time on the ball. First touches for Miami.

Oh, he has been leading from Maskey to Taylor. This is so good for Miami.

He's just going to operate in that space that's going to ask a ton of questions

of the back line of Cruz Azul.

He's going to attract all the attention in the world.

I mean, his turn of pace is remarkable.

I'll zip for a turn.

Maybe an opportunity here for Cruz Azul.

Azul Suena.

Thought about it. Nifty ball in.

Callender couldn't get to it.

1 -1 here in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

Level now, meaning the moment.

Set up maybe even more for Messi and Miami.

Messi spinning away.

Messi, around one and another, toying with terms of goal.

Gets it to Messi.

Messi! It was blocked.

I knew he was going to come in and have an impact on the game.

In domestic, immediately closed down, free kick given. Here we go.

All of us that are in the moment, experiencing the moment, we often

it real? We often question, can he really do this again?

One guy, Pingo Hanley, has got the attention of the world.

There's something that I feel very few people generate, and Lionel Messi can

generate it every time he's about to score a free kick. And it's that the

stadium, whether it's the Inter -Miami team, whether it's the rival team,

everyone gets up, takes out their cell phones, because what is the probability

that Lionel Messi can score a goal? What is the probability?

It was his debut.

He came without preseason.

Let's remember that he joined the team just three or four days before.

He had the pressure to score in the 90 plus 2.

Maybe for an average player it was one out of every 100.

But above all, I stay with the calm, the tranquility with which he, knowing that

the world is putting his eyes on that left foot at that moment, that calm is

admirable. It's admirable because...

It's all set up for him.

On his Inter -Miami debut in front of over 22 ,000.

To introduce Inter -Miami Major League Soccer to the global world here.

There was a moment when it got cold.

I'm trained to always say, like, nothing is unbelievable, right? Because if it's

happened, it has to be believable. But that was one of those moments where

you're just like, are you kidding me?

Those kids want to be here. That's the only reason why he's here.

A winner at the depth for Inter Miami.

2 -1 over Cruz Azul.

It is Messi's moment. It is Messi's night.

The pictures, the audio, they're selling the moment. I don't have to add to it.

You get exactly what you pay for when you watch Lionel Messi.

What will be seared into my brain for so long is the look on David Beckham's

face five, ten minutes after the game's over. And he's just kind of looking off

into the distance.

He's still in disbelief.

In these moments that you don't realize they're that big and then they are.

Things have changed very, very quickly.

As a journalist, my life has definitely changed.

The lives of fans in the U .S. have changed.

There is nothing like this. And he really does

transcend all of sports.

It was so perfect.

The perfect script to the Lino Messi Miami story.

It was the perfect way to start it.

I mean, I didn't, did you expect this? I didn't expect this, you know.

Para mi.

Miami is the city of the possible.

The city where you, as an immigrant, in my case, I'm from Venezuela, you could

start from scratch, without absolutely anything, and go step by step,

many goals.

And Lionel Messi, with this performance in his debut, is the confirmation of

that American dream, of being able to achieve things, of seeing differences.

The hardest thing, I think, for me right now, is to think about 10, 15, 20, 25

years down the road because that's what people are going to ask me.

They're going to ask me about the messy experience.

And it's hard to do that right now because I'm living in the moment. But

will always be one thing that I tell until the day I die.

I've never seen a smile like that.

I've never seen a player in the blink of an eye be happier.

You can see it on his face when he's playing, when he's running and hugging

his... him celebrating his first ever goal, he just seems to be so happy. And

deserves it. He deserves it.

It was a lightning strike for Inter -Miami, the Mavs family, and David

And Major League Soccer and Apple TV are along for the ride.

I don't think he's the biggest put -off guy at all.

He'll be just fine here.