SAN JOSE – Christian Espinoza was just 21 when his Spanish club, Alavés, subbed him onto Barcelona’s Camp Nuo pitch before 74,237 fans. Ten minutes earlier, fellow Argentinian Lionel Messi entered for Barcelona to thunderous applause.
“It was really special to play against players that you grew up watching,” Espinoza recalled Tuesday of that 2-1 upset win in September 2016. “To have the opportunity to do it again is a really special opportunity for me and my team.”
Espinoza and the high-scoring San Jose Earthquakes (5-1-6) will host the legendary Messi and Inter Miami (6-3-2) tonight in MLS’s marquee attraction before PayPal Park’s sellout crowd of 18,000.
zInter Miami forward Lionel Messi, center, practices at the San Jose Earthquakes’ training field on Monday, May 12, 2025, in San Jose, Calif., ahead of Wednesday’s match. (Dai Sugano/Bay Area News Group)
“The biggest mistake you can make is just to focus on Messi,” Earthquakes coach Bruce Arena said. “He’s too good of a player to think you’re ever going to take him out of a game.
“We need to respect Messi for what he is, and he’s one of the greatest players to ever play this game,” Arena added. “Be aware of him on the field, but also respect his teammates who are quite good as well.”
Arena’s Earthquakes are proving quite good at scoring, too.
No team in MLS has scored more goals than their 26. Tied for the league lead are Chicho Arango with eight goals and Espinoza with seven assists. Neither player, as respectful as they are to Messi, is trying to replicate the incomparable Messi.
“It’s not easy to understand Messi’s way to play, because he’s such a different player,” Espinoza said.
Arango, through an interpreter, said: “Yes, Messi is a big player, but there are no things I take from him. My game is totally different. … I’m in a good spell right now and I feel good.”
Arango has four goals in his past four games. He was with Real Salt Lake the past two years and served as its captain in last season’s opening loss at Inter Miami against Messi, who had an assist in a 2-0 win.
Messi has scored five goals in eight games this season for Inter Miami, including his team’s lone one in Saturday’s 4-1 loss at Minnesota. He has 26 goals and 15 assists in regular-season action since joining MLS late in the 2023 season, a year after winning the World Cup with Argentina.
“You just try to do the best you can to close down the spaces when he has the ball,” Espinoza said. “Just be ready, because he can change the game at any moment.”
As for the Earthquakes, Arena’s takeover as coach is seeking to turn them into a playoff contender. He called the Earthquakes’ offensive output “a real positive,” noting that their finishing of plays has vastly improved since his first six games as coach.
San Jose is coming off a 2-0 shutout win Saturday at Colorado, which followed a U.S. Open Cup win last Wednesday against Sacramento Republic and a 4-1 home victory the previous Saturday in MLS action against Portland.
“We have a variety of players that can get goals for us, so that’s a real positive,” Arena said.
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Another positive is the big-game aura, something Arena has experienced both at a national team level and earlier in his MLS coaching career.
“I coached David Beckham (with the 2008-12 Los Angeles Galaxy), so it was similar in some ways when we went into venues around the league,” Arena recalled. “They were well-focused and interested in the game.”
That included a 2008 win over the Earthquakes before 39,872 at the Oakland Coliseum.
“We have a long tradition of success in this market as a soccer club, but over the last couple of years, we’ve lost a little bit of attention in the marketplace,” Arena said. “This game will be a real plus and draw a lot of attention. It’s good for the league and for the San Jose Earthquakes as well.”