As Inter Miami struggles, 3 things Tata Martino would've done differently | OneFootball

Inter Miami have lost five of their last seven in all competitions, crashing out of the Concacaf Champions Cup and sliding down to sixth in the Eastern Conference.

The recent losses have been the most decisive, with the Vancouver Whitecaps (twice), Minnesota United and Orlando City bettering the Herons by multiple goals.

And Lionel Messi has been a figure of frustration, lashing out at officials in the two most recent league defeats, then following the latter loss, criticizing officials in a postgame interview with Michele Gianone on Apple TV.

It all feels like it's coming undone at the worst possible time for manager Javier Mascherano, who is facing increased criticism as well as comparison to predecessor Tata Marinto.

And while it's not entirely clear Miami would be in a better position with the far more experienced Martino in charge, there are certainly some things he may have done differently that could've helped.

Here are 3 of the most obvious:

Resting Messi and the Barca Boys

Messi, Luis Suarez, Jordi Alba and Sergio Busquets are still critically important for the Herons in the long term. But in the short term, the minutes being asked of them are simply too much for four players all age 36 or older.

Messi, Busquets and Alba all gave 90-minute efforts in six of those seven games. Suarez was used more sparingly but still started five matches in that stretch.

Martino also tended toward pushing some of his players too hard at times early in his tenure with Miami. But by the midway point of the 2024 season, he had learned how to say no to his stars' desire to always be on the field, sometimes at their own expense.

Inter Miami CF v Orlando City | Megan Briggs/GettyImages

Finding use for Julian Gressel

Among the most puzzling things about Javier Mascherano's tenure was his complete lack of use of Julian Gressel before Minnesota United claimed him on waivers last month.

It's one thing for Gressel's skillset to not be seen as a perfect fit for Mascherano's more pragmatic, deeper-lying approach.

It's another to leave a player who is an upper-tier MLS talent having played zero minutes while the rest of an older core is over-exerted.

And if Miami not playing Gressel while they shopped him was meant to suggest a high value on the transfer market, it backfired. Everyone in MLS knew the Herons wanted to move on, and Minnesota acquired him (presumably) relatively affordably.

More media transparency

When Messi missed several games early this season while Mascherano clumsily fumbled over the semantics of "injury" versus "fatigue," it prompted plenty of angst.

It also contrasted fairly significantly with Martino's more measured, matter-of-fact disclosure of injury information during Messi's first full season.

Martino was consistently patient with questions about Messi's status during the 2024 season, and his answers were far more detailed. That didn't completely silence conspiracy theories -- some level of that is probably unavoidable with a player of Messi's stature -- but it kept them at a lower volume.

Martino's insistence on such disclosure is no doubt born out of his experience at some of the world's biggest jobs.

In those roles, as with Miami, being as candid as possible ultimately makes life easier on your team and your staff than being evasive.