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Watch: Lionel Messi’s Boston hotel arrival draws crowds
Fans gathered outside of the Ritz Carlton in Boston by the hundreds on Saturday.
The night before a record 65,612 people flooded Gillette Stadium to see Lionel Messi and Inter Miami take on the New England Revolution, hundreds of fans gathered outside of the Ritz Carlton in Boston to catch a glimpse of the Argentine star.
Usually marked by a sea of hot-pink Miami kits, Messi fans opted to wave Argentina jerseys in enthusiastic support of the 36-year-old.
Some fans who assembled on Franklin street even climbed the scaffolding of nearby building construction sites, cameras hoisted in the air, to snap a picture of the international soccer icon.
Danielle Dubois, a local student who stumbled across the scene, estimated that over 300 people swarmed the area.
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“You couldn’t even cross the street, they blocked off traffic because of how many people there were,” Dubois said. “There were literally cops there to make sure fans wouldn’t interfere with the busses.”
“People were climbing lamp posts, people were on each other’s backs… they just wanted to get a picture,” she added.
Messi’s arrival in Boston came after much speculation that the striker would opt out of the competition due to safety concerns over playing on artificial turf.
“We previously played on artificial turf at Charlotte last year and had no problem,” Inter Miami’s head coach Gerardo Martino said Saturday ahead of their arrival in Boston, per ESPN.
No problem, indeed. Messi and his Miami squad beat Caleb Porter’s last-place Revs 4-1 Sunday, putting on a dominant performance in front of the lively crowd.
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