Inter Miami set to improve

Inter Miami set to improve

Another big weekend ahead for TAB soccer customers with an array of cash-boosted pools and a range of challenging matches from the top leagues in Argentina, Brazil and the USA.

By Mark Gleeson

Major League Soccer in the USA continues its intensive schedule even though the country is hosting the Concacaf Gold Cup and many of the league’s top players have been called away on international duty.

Today they celebrate Independence Day and there is a limited holiday programme of matches with the focus on the travails of struggling Inter Miami, who will be hosting Columbus Crew.

The club, co-owned by David Beckham, is struggling at the foot of the table but excitedly awaiting the arrival of Lionel Messi, who is scheduled to make his debut on 21 July after a disappointing season at Paris St Germain.

In the meantime, however, Inter are smoothing the path for the arrival of the Argentine superstar by appointing Tata Martino as coach. He replaces sacked Phil Neville, the former Manchester United and England defender.

Martino coached Messi at Barcelona during the 2013-2014 season before taking charge of the Argentina national team for two years. They reached the final of the 2015 Copa América in Chile and the 2016 United States Centennial Cup with Messi the star performer.

Martino is also a MLS winning coach with Atlanta United, who he led to the title in 2018. After that, he coached Mexico at last year’s World cup final. He is expected to make Inter more competitive almost immediately and smooth Messi’s integration into the side later this month.

Also in the early hours of tomorrow (SA time), is the Los Angeles derby between LA Galaxy and Los Angeles FC, wittily tagged as “El Trafico” in recognition of the traffic congestion for which LA is famous. The car-clogged Californian megacity has seen a shift in dominance from LA Galaxy to the new LAFC, who were only added to MLS in 2018 but are the defending champions after last year’s success.

Galaxy are in the bottom two places in the Western Conference of MLS, while LAFC are among the front-runners.

A second-string South Africa will get their COSAFA Cup campaign under way tomorrow, when they take on Namibia in Durban. They are seeking to regain the regional trophy they won in Gqeberha two years ago.

South Africa also have Botswana and Eswatini in their group with only the top team guaranteed a place in the semi-finals, along with the best runners-up from across the three pools.  

In the other match to be played tomorrow, Eswatini will be hoping for a first-yet COSAFA Cup win over Botswana, having drawn two and lost three of their previous five meetings. They have only scored a single goal in that time.

If past history is anything to go by, Malawi will be the major challengers to defending champions Zambia in Group B and they clash in their pool opener on Thursday.

TAB is adding over R1 million in cash bonuses to selected pools Friday through Sunday and these bets contain a range of exciting matches from the top leagues, like Brazil’s Serie A and the MLS, that play during our winter.