INTER MIAMI
been forced to quarantine and miss playoff games. Under the guidance of infectious disease experts, MLS decided to bring the players back in a controlled environment, test them and allow them to rejoin their teams.
“We received the great news that Rodolfo can participate Friday, he is traveling [Wednesday] to Miami and should be ready to train with the team Thursday and play in the game on Friday,” Alonso said. The team is traveling to Nashville on Thursday.
The coach also said defender Nico Figal and defender/midfielder Brek
Shea are expected to be ready to play Friday. Figal is coming off a left calf injury, and Shea missed two games with an undisclosed injury and was “not medically cleared” for the final game of the regular season.
“Both Figal and Brek
Shea are available for Friday, which is great news, we are happy to be able to count on those two, if nothing happens in the next few days that would change that,” Alonso said.
Although he is happy to get starters back, Alonso stressed that players have come off the bench all season and performed well.
“It is great for a coach to have so many players available; but all season, when we have had struggles, the backup players have stepped up — [Christian] Makoun, [Alvas] Powell, AJ [De La Garza], Mikey. They have been backups the whole time, and when they were asked to start, they played well, which speaks to the daily commitment of the players, staff and club for having everyone practically on same level. We feel calm knowing that whoever plays on Friday will do an incredible job.”
Midfielder Wil Trapp was pleased to learn that the
league was adjusting its protocol to accommodate the players who would have had to miss playoff games.
“Everyone’s been adapting in every sector of the world this entire year,” Trapp said. “To the league’s credit, I think they’ve done a very, very good job whether it be the MLS bubble, MLS is Back tournament in Orlando to how they’ve handled these regular season games. Ultimately, in the biggest games you want all your players available, so it makes a lot of sense that with protocols being in place and abided by that we can allow that to happen, in our sense, with Rodolfo. We’re very happy to have him available as we step into this game and the excitement surrounding it.”
Inter Miami faced many hurdles in its inaugural season, including having to win its final home game in a tropical storm to qualify for the playoffs. Trapp said that victory over FC Cincinnati injected the team with new life heading into the playoffs.
“The Cincinnati game, there were so many things surrounding it, things indicative of South Florida. ... I thought hurricane season was over,” Trapp said, laughing. “We were just so happy to have not only qualified, but we were rewarded for what has been a difficult year. … We’ve had to suffer in many ways, but in the end, we wanted to make the playoffs. We did that. Now, what can we go do? It’s a brand new season in our minds, brand new objective to reach for and try to reach and now we have that opportunity.”
●Nashville SC center back Walker Zimmerman, 27, was named Major League Soccer’s Defender of the Year. Nashville allowed an average of 0.96 goals a game, lowest of an expansion team in league history. The team had nine clean sheets and allowed just 22 total goals, thirdfewest in the league.