Inter Miami will hope to rebound from their 4-0 thrashing to New York Red Bulls when they play host to NYCFC this Saturday night at Chase Stadium.

The Herons remain near the top of the Eastern Conference standings despite dropping two of their last three matches against Red Bulls and CF Montreal without superstar Lionel Messi. The eight-time Ballon d’Or winner is recovering from a hamstring injury and will miss his team’s clash with NYCFC at the weekend.

NYCFC have posted just one win in their five games played in the 2024 campaign. The lone victory came against Toronto FC a couple of weeks back and Nick Cushing’s seat continues to get warmer with each passing game they fail to take points from. NYCFC will hope to steal a point against Miami with Messi not featuring for Gerardo ‘Tata’ Martino’s side to lift themselves from 14th place in the East.

Here’s 90min’s preview of the Herons vs the Boys in Blue.

Messi remains unavailable due to a hamstring problem suffered in the second leg of Miami’s Champions Cup contest against Nashville SC. With other forwards like Benjamin Cremaschi and Facundo Farias out injured, the Herons’ frontline has been quite inconsistent without Messi.

Nicolas Freire is also likely to miss out as he’s still on the road to recovery from a hamstring injury. Martino will look to lean on Serhiy Kryvtsov, Tomas Aviles and Noah Allen in the meantime.

Drake Callender, Diego Gomez, David Ruiz and Federico Redondo are all expected to return on time from international duty to feature against NYCFC.

Inter Miami predicted lineup vs NYCFC (3-5-2): Callender; Aviles, Kryvtsov, Allen; Taylor, Gressel, Busquets, Gomez, Alba; Suarez, Campana.

Forward Talles Magno is set to return to training by the middle of next month as he’s still recovering from a knee injury. Cushing has relied on Hannes Wolf and Julian Fernandez to create chances from out wide while Magno has been sidelined.

Tomas Romero, Mitja Ilenic and Jovan Mijatovic are set to return to the club later this week after being on international duty with their respective El Salvador, Slovenia Under-19 and Serbia Under-19 teams.

NYCFC predicted lineup vs Inter Miami (3-4-3): Freese; Tanasijevic, Martins, Risa; Jasson, Perea, Sands, O’Toole; Fernandez, Rodriguez, Wolf.

Inter Miami are a force to be reckoned with at home at Chase Stadium and that theme will continue as with a win against NYCFC. The strike partnership of Leo Campana and Luis Suarez will be back among the goals against a below-average NYC defense.

With players like Redondo and Ruiz able to come off the bench to see out the win, it will be a comfortable victory in the end for Miami to stay near the top of the East while the Boys in Blue sink further down the table.

Prediction: Inter Miami 3-0 NYCFC