Lionel Messi will not play Sunday for Inter Miami due to a problem with "old scar tissue," ESPN's Ross Devonport reported.
Inter Miami head coach Gerardo "Tata" Martino confirmed the news during a Friday press conference.
"It is probable that these scars bother [him] and don't allow him to even be mentally free to play a game," Martino said about Messi's injury. "It is difficult. We have all experienced pain when we have hit our scars on the corner of a table and this is like that."
Messi asked to be subbed out in the 88th minute of a World Cup qualifying match between Argentina and Ecuador earlier this month.