Lionel Messi makes indelible impression in Inter Miami’s 3-2 victory over Sporting KC

Compelled and animated by soccer megastar Lionel Messi, history and the future blurred together on Saturday night at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium.

On the 28th anniversary of the inaugural game played by the franchise now known as Sporting KC and just two years now before Kansas City will be a 2026 FIFA World Cup host, all at once you could glimpse both how far soccer has come here over the last generation-plus and where it’s going.

Returning to the first home that the club christened as the Wiz and a year later dubbed the Wizards never could even half-fill for an MLS game, the spectacle drew an announced audience of 72,610 — the third-largest regular-season crowd in MLS history and surely one of the most-attended games in the world on Saturday.

The “out of this world” environment, Sporting coach Peter Vermes said after the 3-2 loss, was a “prelude to the World Cup, and then some.”

The vibe was “a taste for everybody of what that World Cup is going to bring,” said Sporting forward Daniel Salloi. And a taste for everybody how everything has changed since the club’s inception.

“This is where we live now,” said Diego Gutierrez, among the club originals honored Saturday night.

That momentum figures to peak during the World Cup as Kansas City will play host to six games, including a quarterfinal. And those games will take on a personality of their own, as Vermes noted, because the fan dynamics will be different between nations than what we witnessed at Arrowhead on Saturday — when I suspect that plenty booming out the call and response of “Sporting … KC” also chanted Messi’s name after his beautiful goal and spellbinding assist.

But no doubt this was a snapshot of World Cup flavor and energy.

“You can see it’s radiating from the field,” said Sean Bowers, another original who is now the general manager of the San Diego Sockers. “It’s just all over. It’s going all the way up top.”

Something they never would have imagined seeing back then.

But for all that broader context and meaning, and the considerable amount of Sporting jerseys mingled among the Miami and Argentina versions of Messi gear, the essence and indelible images of this night were all about Messi — whose anticipated presence was the reason Sporting wanted to play at Arrowhead for the first time since 2010 instead of its home at Children’s Mercy Park.

And what a presence it was for the crowd that is likely to remain the Missouri record for years to come since Arrowhead will have thousands of seats removed to comply with FIFA standards in 2026.

Even at age 36 ... watching him play, where you sat and who you saw him with felt like the sorts of things you’ll never forget.

Because he’s the type of mesmerizing, ninja-like, how-did-he-do-that force who at any given moment can have you involuntarily rising out of your seat.

Or, in the case of at least five fans — some more successfully than others — trying to run out of their seats through a thicket of security guards visibly to get onto the pitch and be in his aura. Messi even indulged a selfie with a very young-looking one of them.

But his most riveting moment, more so even than the goal, was what appeared to be a no-look pass splitting two defenders to tee up a goal by Diego Gomez. It was Mahomeseque, really — a particularly nice touch with Patrick Mahomes in the house and having wished him well earlier in the evening.

“He can create something out of thin air,” Salloi said.

And thus create something that’s beyond the imagination.

Something Vermes first saw nearly 20 years ago when he scouted him for the 2005 FIFA World Youth Championship when Vermes was an assistant coach with the U.S. under-20 team, and something that leads him to believe Messi is the best there ever was.

That kind of transcendent greatness and why it’s so captivating is hard to define and describe. But I liked a point U.S. Soccer CEO JT Batson made when he recently was in town and I’d asked him about the Messi effect and why so many are drawn to him.

“I think people love seeing greatness in person …” Batson said. “And in a world where we live through our phones or our televisions (and are) sort of not in the moment, sports is one of those things where you are in the moment.

“And seeing one of the all-time greats in the moment do their thing, there just aren’t many moments in life where you get that.”

And we got just that on Saturday night in an unforgettable scene that Salloi called a “full-circle moment” in terms of Kansas City’s soccer past, present and future.

But also a moment enabled and embellished by the chance to see greatness in person.