Inter Miami CF captain Lionel Messi’s stellar performance against CF Montréal on Saturday night earn him Major League Soccer (MLS) Player of the Matchday presented by Michelob ULTRA honors for Matchday 23.
Messi earns POTM honors for a third time this regular season after his spectacular showing to help Inter Miami achieve its largest margin of victory in Club history in the 7-1 win over CF Montréal. The Argentine maestro scored four goals and dished out an assist.
Messi’s brilliance for the evening began with a late goal in the first half.
Our captain followed by opening the second half with a solo effort to strike in the 52'.
Messi then carried on his world class performance with three more goal contributions in the final stretch of the match. Our captain assisted Luis Suárez in the 80th minute, followed by finding the back of the net with a tidy chip in the 83rd minute and with a free kick banger in the sixth minute of stoppage time. He has now tallied 18 goals in 19 appearances this regular season as he leads the race for the MLS Golden Boot, while also contributing a notable 10 assists.
The remarkable performance marked the first time in his MLS career that Messi has scored four goals in a regular season match, becoming the 19th different player in league history to accomplish this feat. Messi also owns one-fourth of all the regular-season games in MLS history with at least five goal contributions, having now done this three separate times in his career. By producing multiple goals, Messi also became the fastest player to hit 20 multi-goal games in the regular season, doing so in just 72 total matches.
This is the third time Messi has been named MLS Player of the Matchday in 2026 (Matchdays 2 and 8), and it is the 15th honor in his career. Messi has now eclipsed Jeff Cunningham (14) for the second-most Player of the Matchday awards in league history, behind only Landon Donovan (19).
The MLS Player of the Matchday presented by Michelob ULTRA is selected each matchday of the regular season through both media and fan voting in a process conducted by MLS Communications. A panel of journalists from the North American Soccer Reporters (NASR) comprises 75 percent of the vote, while an Instagram fan vote represents the remaining 25 percent of voting. NASR consists of members of print, television, radio, and online media.
