Lionel Messi scored twice as Intermiami began a fuss-out fight in the final 13 minutes, beating 10 Orlando City 3-1 and punching tickets to the League Cup final.
Miami stared at his semi-final loss with a 1-0 down in the 77th minute, but Messi marked a return from a muscle injury with two key goals as Javier Mascherano’s team came together.
After Martin Ojeda and Rodrigo de Paul approached at both ends, Orlando missed a chance to stand out in the 23rd minute as Ivan Anglo rolled his shots wide as he got clean.
However, the visitors broke through at first half of the stoppage time, and after Maximiliano Falcon’s clearance recovered from him, Marco Pasaric fired into the roof of the net.
Miami struggled to move forward early in the second half, but the game changed to 75 minutes as the already booked David Brecaro caught on the wrong side of Tadeo Arende in the box and pulled him down.
Brecaro was shown his second yellow card, and Messi stroked the resulting penalty 1-1 in the lower right corner.
Orlando showed off his big foot in the busy penalty area, swapping passes with Jordi Alba and clung to the 10 men until the 88th minute when Messi finished across Pedro Garase.
What a great goal pic.twitter.com/l2mdmoxssr
– Intermiami CF (@intermiamif) August 28, 2025
And after Luis Suarez played a minute in the suspension time, the substitute Telasco Segovia went home, so there was still time to aim to clinch.
Miami’s opponent in Sunday’s final will be the Seattle Sounders. The Seattle Sounders welcome Heron to Lumenfield after beating LA Galaxy 2-0 in the other semi-finals on Wednesday.
Pedro de Lavega drilled the Seattle opener following the goalmouth scramble in the seven minutes, with Andrew Thomas making two big first-half saves to keep the lead.
Osaze de Rosario scored an excellent solo goal to make it 2-0 early in the second half, and despite Nouhou Tolo’s late exit of Wild Runge with Gabriel Pec, the Sounders stuck for a deserved victory.
Data Debrief: League Cup Specialist
So far, no team has played in multiple League Cup finals. The four showpieces featured eight different clubs.
They were Cruz Azur, Tigress Wuan, Leon, Seattle, Miami, Nashville SC, Columbus Crew and Los Angeles FC.
However, Seattle and Miami will each appear in their second final on Sunday, with the latter hoping to become the first repeat winner.
It was Messi’s brace that made the semi-finals, and he is now within the target of one of Dennis Banga’s best league cup record, at the age of 13.