by Inter Miami added another superstar to the hole. The announcement of Inter Miami’s latest signing means that Lionel Messi will link up with another former Barcelona player at the DRV PNK Stadium next season. Joining fellow former Camp Nou heroes Messi, Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba, Luis Suárez has agreed a one-year deal with the MLS side, with the option of another year.
But by the time Messi and Suárez take to the field for Inter Miami, it will have been almost four years since they last played together. Suárez, who turned 37 in January, played for three clubs in that time, in three countries. As he battles the inevitable effects of ageing, how different is the player to the version of Suárez set for a Miami reunion with Messi?
Suárez left Barcelona in the summer of 2020, a year before Messi left for Paris Saint-Germain. He started with Diego Simeone’s Atlético Madrid, a club whose on-field philosophy of dogged win-at-all-costs and defensive organization stands in stark contrast to the cultured play taking place at the Camp Nou. But Uruguay prospered.
“Expectations were certainly high when Suárez arrived at Atlético and we can’t forget that he scored 16 league goals for Barcelona the previous season, despite not playing that much,” says the football journalist who based in Madrid, Euan McTear. “So most fans were confident he could contribute. The question mark was how long he would be able to play at a high level and whether he would be able to avoid injury. Fortunately for Atlético, their gamble paid off.”
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After appearing to lose some of his sharpness in his final months with Barcelona, the former Liverpool striker was revitalized at the move and, if his performances were any indicator, he was determined to show that to decline too stand. Scoring 21 goals in 32 games, Suarez was instrumental in delivering Atlético’s first La Liga title in seven years.
“He was a consistent contributor throughout,” says McTear, “although Atlético as a whole fell off in the second half of the campaign as the pressure mounted. But Suárez rarely feels pressure and has kept his cool in recent weeks. He was one of the few players in the squad who had won the league before and that experience was vital, especially as he scored the winning goals against Osasuna and Real Valladolid in the last fortnight.
“If Barcelona moved on from Suárez because they were afraid he would refuse, they were right. They just got the time wrong. The decline eventually came, as it does for everyone, but it wasn’t really until the second half of 2021-22 that Suárez lost his place as a starter.
When his two-year contract with Atlético expired in the summer of 2022, Suárez went home, working with his youth team, Nacional of Montevideo, Uruguay. Seventeen years after making his professional debut for the club at the age of 18, the Uruguayan superstar led Nacional to the Primeira Division title with 138 caps, scoring eight goals in sixteen appearances in a short six-month period . Then, in December 2022, it was on to Brazil and Grêmio.
“For a Brazilian club to get a player of Suárez’s stature would be great news,” says Robbie Blakeley, a football journalist based in Rio. “There was some concern about his physical condition. The problems with her knees are well documented. But he is a world-class talent, one of the best centre-forwards of the 21st century, so there was more excitement than concern when he arrived.
“He scored a goal five minutes into his first game and had a hat-trick before half-time. That really inspired Grêmio fans and people all over Brazil.”
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Suárez struggled with knee problems for much of his late Barcelona career. But in Brazil, due to the heavy schedule of regional competitions, national cups and national championships, his knee problems became more troublesome. He began receiving painkiller injections before and after games and practiced sparingly. He signed a two-year deal with Grêmio, but by July, there were reports that he could cancel his deal given his injury struggles.
“I think he felt he couldn’t do it anymore,” says Blakeley. “The Brazilian calendar is very tough and the pitches are not always the best. He had a conversation with the board. I think there was already talk that Suárez was going to move to Miami. But they agreed to a deal that if he stayed until the end of the year he could cancel the second year of his contract.
“Even since then, he has given everything to the club – every drop of sweat, every drop of blood. He ran himself into the ground. That’s why the fans loved him so much and he’s become such a hero, such an idol, in such a short time.”
Suárez finished the campaign with 26 goals and 17 assists in 53 games in all competitions, enough to recently inspire Grêmio to second place in the league table and earn him the Ballon d’Or as player of the season. Due to age and injuries, Suarez has not been the player of his early days at Liverpool and Barcelona – all quick turns, driving runs and penalty box inventiveness – but he has remained highly effective as a scorer, creator and leader.
“His knees were really holding him back in terms of his speed and his ability to beat defenders,” says Blakeley, “but his movement was still there, his positioning, his in-game intelligence to find space, to connect with middle of the field. and attack. And his territory doesn’t seem to have diminished. The Brazilian league is clearly a way, way down from Prison and La Liga, but he was able to adapt very easily.
“There was definitely some movement [remaining in his game], but I didn’t see him falling back as much as I would have seen him with Liverpool and Barcelona or even Atlético Madrid. It was more of a static goal center forward. He would stay up front. But his intelligence shined through at this level, his ability to find space, lose a marker and open himself up. That was his style of play in Brazil.”
A little less mobile these days and injuries are a recurrent issue, but still in possession of a sharp mind for the game and able to win the great game – it seems that the superstar between Miami South Americans still has strength in part.
