10 questions for the 2025 MLS season: Will Lionel Messi, Inter Miami win MLS Cup after early exit in 2024?

While La Galaxy head coach Greg Vanney celebrated the MLS Cup victory of his team in December, the journey of his team from 13th place in the Western Conference offered the stage of the winners a grim memory of the unpredictability of MLS a year later .

“There are many things that can balance teams and small things often make the difference,” he said. “That often happened in this competition and you see that a lot around MLS. Teams that may not have all the pieces have all the pieces that they need the following year and things come together.”

That remains the case when the competition approaches its 30th season, which starts on Saturday, adding layers and layers of intrigues at the start of the season – and forcing various questions about how things will shake. However, the questions are not only limited to the fortunes of the best and worst teams of last season; The changing variables extend to the general reputation of the competition, because it reaches a monumental season and for a crucial year in American football.

Here are 10 questions prior to the 2025 ml season.

1. Will Inter Miami MLS Cup win?

Let’s start with the question that most MLS Casuals ask, that is, if Lionel Messi and the company will win the trophy that they have missed so far. If someone dives a little deeper, this question splits into two – is the strategy that led them to success in 2024 sustainable for another year, and will new head coach Javier Mascherano be a helping hand or an obstacle? An exaggerated dependence on aging stars comes with his challenges and feels more like a schedule structure approach that was successful in MLS ten years ago than now, although the supporters’ Shield Win of Miami may turn out to be different in 2024, at least temporarily. However, Mascherano is an unknown quantity – he does not have much managing experience and has not really earned praise reviews during his stints responsible for the national teams of Argentina. It should provide a fascinating season and one that can remember many of the entertaining peculiarities of MLS, even if Miami starts winning the whole thing.

2. Will the La Galaxy repeat as MLS Cup winners?

Miami may have won the shield of the supporters, but De La Galaxy took the main prize of MLS in 2024 and did this after a very strong season. They also confirmed a winning approach to schedules that feels modern in MLS, luring younger talents from Europe with great salary to play major roles. However, this low season has not been friendly to the side of Greg Vanney – the rules of the Salary Cap of the competition meant that the Galaxy MLS Cup objector Dejan Joveljic and MLS Cup MVP Gaston Brugman had to exchange to remain compliant. The policy has the most recent criticism of Galaxy designated player Maya YoshidaTo a large extent because he had to do a wage reduction to return, but everything forces a greater question about how baptism is a repeat championship.

3. How does the MLS of Gregg Berhalter go back?

After six years away from the competition where he made a name for himself, former US National Team Head Coach GREGG Berhalter is back in MLS, not just to increase his own stock, but to make the Chicago Fire relevant again. It will not be a small achievement – they have missed the late season in each of the last seven seasons, with several iterations of a rebuild that falls. Berhalter itself will play a major role in the new reconstruction as a head coach And Sports director, who used his first low season to build a selection with young domestic talent and a handful of people with years and years of MLS experience. They will definitely not be the end product in 2025, but creating a competition is the main objective this year, and the strong MLS reputation of Berhalter will be central on the way.

4. Which teams mount a comeback?

The fire is not the only ones who hope to make a statement in 2025. Look no further than Atlanta United and the San Jose, which were busy in the low season and entering the new season with a new look. Atlanta made a special splash by signing Emmanuel Latte Late from Middlesbrough for a reported record transfer costs worth $ 22 million, and Miguel Almiron from Newcastle United. In the meantime, the earthquakes added the will of Cristian Arango and Josef Martinez, because they hope to make the play -offs the second time in the past five years. Both will also have new head coaches-an-ew York City FC boss Ronny Deila is now at Atlanta, while the earthquakes have hired Bruce Arena in his first performance because MLS suspended him for making insensitive and inappropriate comments in 2023.

5. How is San Diego FC going?

MLS welcomes his 30th team on Sunday when San Diego FC travels to the Galaxy for their very first MLS competition. Even in a competition where expansion teams enter the competition with Flash, San Diego may seem to be a sloppy newcomer, slowly a team of players with a wide range of experience and a young head coach in Mikey Varas. Hirvening Lozano is the great player of the team and it is expected that he will settle well in MLS, but there is always a big question mark for a team that has never been played together before. Perhaps an even bigger question, however, is whether that links to Mohamed Salah and the Kevin De Bruyne of Mohamed Salah and Manchester City will become a reality in the summer when their contracts are in the summer.

6. How will the first cash-for-player near the Pan Out?

MLS is known for his handwring rules, but they introduced something simple this season-one trade in cash for players, where teams use the mechanism to make a splash. Rising USMNT -Talent Jack McMlynn was the first home soil to make such a movement when he became a member of the Houston Dynamo for a $ 2.1 million deal, while the MVP Luciano Acosta from 2023 proceeded from FC Cincinnati to FC Dallas in a $ 6 million trade. The two players will be especially intriguing to follow in 2025, especially because their acquisitions look like a sign of the clubs intention to rise a level this season. No matter how well these two play this season, however, it is a welcome control change from MLS only for its simplicity and will hopefully herald some blockbuster transactions.

7. How will the Columbus crew Cucho Hernandez replace?

One of the big surprises of this low season was Cucho Hernandez’s Transfer Deadline Day Move to Real Betis, so that the Columbus crew could drop a club record transfer of $ 10 million. However, it is not exactly clear what the crew will do to replace the Output of Hernandez – the 2023 ML Cup MVP scored 58 goals for the crew in 94 games, which will be difficult to replicate. The successor of Hernandez can come in the summerWith the late transfer that slows the ability of the crew to put another like -minded player in line. However, how this influences their season is a big question.

8. Which young players leave for Europe?

Hernandez joins a long list of young players who trades MLS for a European competition, and there is no doubt that various current MLS talents are focusing on similar movements about the Atlantic Ocean. The focus will be primarily on members of the American national youth teams, who will probably treat a move to Europe as an opportunity to take the attention of USMNT head coach Mauricio Pochettino in preparation for the World Cup 2026. McGlynn, a member of the U-23 U-23 U-23 Olympic team from last year and someone who was impressed in January, can be someone to keep an eye on, but the list of contenders is just as wide and varied as as The non-ZO-Monolithic European football scene is.

9. Does MLS ‘Cup Competition Strategy work?

MLS caused a considerable indignation with its near-complete withdrawal from the US Open Cup last year, and the competition will remain in a version of this strategy in 2025, demonstrably out of necessity. The 30 teams of the competition are divided over the US Open Cup, the MLS Liga MX creation called The Leagues Cup and the New-Look Club World Cup, without a team in more than two competitions. The division is designed to combat congestion of the fixture, an increasingly larger problem with football, but asking for validity and relevance will certainly follow each of these competitions this year. Although MLS has little control with the Club World Cup and is demonstrable hands-off with the US Open Cup, the fact that those feelings will stay on the Leagues Cup for another year will add a low consternation to this year’s procedure .

10. Will MLS do enough to position itself for success in 2026?

Over the American football landscape, 2025 is considered the year to lay the foundation before the nation – and the world – look shifts to the World Cup 2026 that the US will mainly accommodate. The tournament is seen as an opportunity to further feed the growth of the sport in this country, which is an important point of conversation in MLS since the arrival of Messi and the start of the broadcast agreement of the competition with Apple in 2023. Messi undoubtedly has new new ones Brought attention to MLS, but at the moment it is unclear how the competition will convert the temporary consciousness into long -term profit. The good news for them is that there is still some time to find out, but it is currently difficult to predict where MLS is going from here in both the Global Soccer Landscape and the American Sports Picture.