MIAMI (AP) \u2014 Lionel Messi scored three times in the second half to finish off his first four-goal effort in MLS play while adding an assist, and Inter Miami scored six unaswered goals in a 7-1 romp over CF Montreal on Saturday night.<\/p>\n
Messi snapped a 1-1 tie in the 40th minute when he found the net for the 15th time, scoring off a free kick. <\/p>\n
The reigning Golden Boot Award winner and league MVP scored for a 3-1 lead in the 52nd minute. His 17th and 18th goals of the season came in the 83rd and sixth minute of stoppage time with the final one also coming off a free kick. Messi began the day two behind Petar Musa of FC Dallas in the goals race.<\/p>\n
Carlos Casimiro scored with a header off a corner kick by Telasco Segovia in the 20th minute to give Inter Miami a 1-0 lead. It was the first goal for the 34-year-old midfielder in his sixth league appearance and a career-best ninth assist for Segovia in his second MLS season.<\/p>\n
Montreal tied it in the 37th minute on a goal by Fabian Herbers \u2014 his first of the campaign.<\/p>\n
Luis Su\u00e1rez scored his 11th goal with an assist from Messi \u2014 his 10th \u2014 for a 4-1 lead in the 80th minute and 18-year-old rookie Alexander Shaw made it 6-1 in the 89th with his first goal in three appearances and 37 minutes of play.<\/p>\n
Dayne St. Clair finished with three saves for Inter Miami (12-4-6), which finished August with a 1-2-2 record after a fifth straight victory over Montreal. <\/p>\n
Thomas Gillier saved five shots for Montreal (5-11-6). <\/p>\n
It was Inter Miami’s first victory since beating Montreal 1-0 on the road to close out July. Su\u00e1rez won that one on a penalty kick in the 81st minute.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tUp next<\/p>\n
Montreal: At Philadelphia Union on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Miami: Hosts Atlanta United on Saturday.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
\n See AP\u2019s full soccer coverage here\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MIAMI (AP) \u2014 Lionel Messi scored three times in the second half to finish off his first four-goal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":384990,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[25123,2205,123,125,124],"class_list":["post-384989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-ap-sports","tag-associated-press","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=384989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384989\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/384990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=384989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=384989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=384989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}