MOST of the football buzz in the United States this weekend was focused around the World Cup draw that took place in Washington DC yesterday, but there is also a big domestic game this weekend as the MLS champion will be crowned with some of the biggest names in the recent history of the sport involved.

Events such as the World Cup draw demand that representatives from global sporting media arrive from around the world to see some balls pulled out of pots, rather than put into goals.

Once billed as “quirky but informative“ ceremonies where the main purpose is for national teams to learn who they will be facing, where, and when in the group stage, it is now more a ceremony of PR for world leaders and their specific Fifa-endorsed, freshly sportswashed brand of politics.

The farce that is this particular World Cup draw was epitomised by the fact that Donald Trump was set to receive a “peace prize“ created for him by infatuated Fifa president Gianni Infantino.

A day earlier, the commissioner of Major League Soccer (MLS), Don Garber, delivered his annual “state of the league” address at Audi Field, just down the Potomac River from where the World Cup draw was held at the John F. Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts (no doubt Trump will rename it after himself at some point).

MLS owes much of its existence to the previous World Cup in the United States in 1994, when Fifa stipulated that the country create a new professional league as part of the World Cup hosting agreement.

MLS was born from that, but hit hard times in the early 2000s, eventually salvaged by a small group of owners who took control of all of the league’s teams and disbanded others, the Miami Fusion and Tampa Bay Mutiny, resulting in a 10-team league.

After being close to folding, MLS just about survived, and today has 30 teams, including three in Canada, and a new team in Miami, which now boasts one of the best players of all time in Lionel Messi.

“The next decade will redefine what’s possible for MLS and North American soccer,” Garber said on Thursday. “As the world turns towards North America, the 2026 World Cup will soon serve as rocket fuel for our entire ecosystem, and it will do so for MLS.”

A day after the World Cup draw, the MLS championship game involving teams from two of the 2026 World Cup hosts, Canada and the United States, will take place in Fort Lauderdale, not far from Miami, where Fifa now has a base, too.

Today, with the World Cup draw done and no doubt dominating the news cycle, there will be an actual game of association football involving some all-time greats of the sport.

Former Barcelona legends Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba will be playing their final game for Inter Miami before retirement, while Luis Suarez’s likely place on the bench for Inter Miami might be an indication that it could be his last dance, too.

What you might not see amid all of this soccer talk is much acknowledgement that Canada (and indeed Mexico) is a co-host of this World Cup, and has a team in the MLS Cup final.

Vancouver Whitecaps will travel to Fort Lauderdale today (the team with the better record in the league season hosts the play-off final) in an attempt to spoil the party for Messi and co.

The Whitecaps have a star of their own in Thomas Mueller, who has been a breath of fresh air since arriving in MLS in August. 

While Messi has not taken part in the kinds of media duties usually required of players in the league, and seems to have been given special dispensation by MLS in this regard, Mueller has embraced a jovial back and forth with the media and always gives good value in interviews.

“We have so many warriors,” Mueller said as Vancouver defeated San Diego FC to reach their first-ever MLS Cup final. “We are also so skilled, skilled as a big group. 

“We don’t just have one very big player, we have so many strong guys, so many qualities. 

“But we have to bring it together, and we are growing and learning, and I’m very happy to be part of this and bring my experience to the group. 

“I have a feeling it is working really well, as we are in the final! One more step.”

Mueller commenting that the Whitecaps don’t rely on one player could be seen as a reference to Inter Miami and Messi.

When asked about the comparison between the two situations in a post-match press conference, he added: “Maybe they rely a little bit more on him than we do on me, because we are such a good group.”

MLS operates with a salary cap system, but some star players, called Designated Players (DP), can be acquired outside salary cap restrictions. Former Whitecaps coach and proud socialist Vanni Sartini referred to one of the club’s DPs, Scottish attacking midfielder Ryan Gauld, as a “working class DP.”

That approach and team spirit, where no one player is valued more than any of the others regardless of squad status, has remained into a new era under Jesper Sorensen and is epitomised in Mueller.

Amid the charade of a World Cup draw, it is a reminder of the values inherent to the sport itself, based around teamwork, solidarity, and equality, traits which Mueller and Sorensen hope will lead their team to success against the odds when they meet the flashy team from Fort Lauderdale this evening.