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FORT LAUDERDALE — The final act, the one everyone came to see, had Lionel Messi carrying the trophy over to his Inter Miami teammates late Saturday afternoon. This is how he’s done it everywhere he’s been, the captain and a trophy, and now he did at Chase Stadium.

“Mes-si!” the crowd chanted.

The trophy looked nearly as big as Messi as he walked on the makeshift stage amid his teammates. But there, in that moment, as he held the Major League Soccer championship trophy aloft, as confetti dropped and fireworks flew, Messi didn’t look like the league’s marketing machine or the world’s most recognizable athlete.

He just looked like a star happy to win again. His smile said that much, as did his hugs with teammates and that laugh he carried all o

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