Before the round of 16of the FIFA 2025 club World CupBetween Inter Miami and PSG, many Messi supporters and the American team still hoped for Mercedes-Benz Stadium, with more than 73,000 spectators. However, at the fifth minute of the meeting, PSG opened the scoring thanks to a superb free kick combination of the head by João Neves. All these hopes have gone.

From the moment Neves marked, the truth broke out. The gap between MLS teams and the best European clubs was too great and impossible to fill. Last October, FIFA President Gianni Infantino took precedence over Messi and his Inter Miami teammates when he announced to everyone’s surprise that he adapted the qualifications for the Club World Cup to the MLS group phase.

Eight months later, Messi and the Barça veterans received four fast goals in the first period against the best team in Europe in the round of 16, and the match was finished at the start. Beaten 0-4, Inter Miami, last representative of the MLS at the Home Club World Cup, was eliminated.

But even if Inter Miami is far behind PSG, Infantino has already achieved its objective. The powerful president of FIFA needs the quality of Messi, because some of the most popular teams in Europe do not participate in the tournament, including Barça, Liverpool, Arsenal and especially Manchester United.

Infantino failed to find a reason to take MU to the FIFA 2025 FIFA Club World Cup. Consequently, a tournament organized in the United States without Messi would not manage to attract the public of this country, sometimes indifferent to the arrival of large foreign clubs in the middle of summer.

But the “stuffing” of Messi and Inter Miami seems intended to show in the United States how far their clubs are far from their European and South American counterparts. Asked about how to fill this gap, Inter Miami coach Javier Mascherano, another Barça veteran, passed the ball to someone else. “MLS people know better than me what they have to do to progress in the championship and be competitive,” he said.

Inter Miami can at least keep its head high after the group phase, with a victory against Porto and dummies against Palmeiras and Al-Ahly (Egypt). PSG is light years. He proved that his 0-1 defeat against Botafogo was an accident. Before accessing the FIFA 2025 club World Cup, he signed a record victory in the Champions League final, humiliating Inter Milan 5-0. He then opened the group phase of the tournament with a 4-0 victory against Atlético and closed it by beating Seattle Sounders 2-0.

Last night, PSG “disaster” against Inter Miami in the first half. Despite the domination and control of the Messi game and his teammates throughout the second period, and despite the replacement of several key players by coach Luis Enrique, the local team could not do anything more to score an honor. In this context, Luis Suarez’s disappointment was eloquent.

Infantino used Inter Miami’s victory in supporters’ Shield as a pretext to participate in the tournament. Inter Miami qualified. However, the MLS champions are the winners of the MLS Cup, namely the Galaxy, after the elimination of Inter Miami in the first round of the Playoffs by Atlanta United. The La Galaxy did not participate in the Club World Cup, any more than the Champions of England, Spain and Italy.

Obviously, with one -way matches, too much gap and especially the fact that representatives of the host country were all exempt from the knockout stages, the quality and reputation of the new version of the FIFA club World Cup were considerably affected. This is the flaw in the plane of FIFA.