Al Ahly v Inter Miami: Line-ups, stats and preview

Preview for Al Ahly v Inter Miami

Gianni Infantino’s brainchild will come to fruition on Saturday night in Florida as Al Ahly and Inter Miami open the inaugural, expanded version of the Club World Cup.

FIFA president Infantino will settle into his padded seat at Hard Rock Stadium and watch the 12-time African champions take on the MLS side crudely shoehorned into the competition to enable Lionel Messi to take part.

Miami won last season’s Supporters’ Shield for the team with the best regular season record before making a swift exit from the playoffs. Nevertheless, that gave Infantino everything he required to manipulate a route in for Messi.

From a fan’s perspective, that’s unargaubly good news – who doesn’t want to watch the greatest player of all time before he hangs up his boots? – but it does little to increase the credibility of a tournament that already appears one too many given the packed global calendar.

These two teams have been placed in Group A alongside Palmeiras and Porto and will, realistically, need a win here to stand a chance of going through.

Miami have the experience while Al Ahly have the youthful exuberance.

Messi is one of four former Barcelona players who have done it all at the highest level, alongside Sergio Busquets, Jordi Alba and Luis Suarez.

Busquets admitted last month it will be a tall order for Javier Mascherano’s men to compete.

He told DAZN: “It’s clear that we are not at the level to compete at the Club World Cup, but we will try to compete in our group. Go game by game, fight and hopefully advance to the next round though it’ll be difficult.”

It was hardly a glowing endorsement for an event none of the quartet thought they’d be playing in when they agreed to wind down their careers in the Miami sunshine.

Al-Ahy qualified by virtue of winning the CAF Champions League in 2020-21, 2022-23 and 2023-24 and will arrive in the United States confident of making a splash.

Midfielder Emam Ashour was in bullish mood ahead of the opener and is relishing the chance to face Messi.

“No doubt, I’m fired up to face the best player in the world,” Ashour told FIFA.com. “I’m confident that we’re capable of achieving something worthy of our name and the Al Ahly name.”