Lionel Messi celebrated his return from injury with two goals and an assist, helping Inter Miami to a 3-1 win over Philadelphia Union.

The World Cup-winning Argentina captain had not played since injuring his ankle in the Copa America final against Colombia in July.

As a result, he missed this month’s World Cup qualifiers and sat out eight games for his Major League Soccer team, even though the team leads the MLS Eastern Conference.

But the 37-year-old former Barcelona star played the full 90 minutes in his first start for Inter Miami in three months and was in charge.

Philadelphia took the lead after 58 seconds through Mikael Uhre, but Miami equalized in the 26th minute, with Messi rounding a defender and slotting home a pass from Luis Suarez, which was good work from another former Barça team-mate, Jordi Alba.

Messi put his team ahead four minutes later after Alba assisted him and set up Suarez for Miami’s third in second-half injury time.

After the match, Messi, who has scored 14 goals in 13 games this season, admitted he was “a little tired”.

“I really wanted to come back, I hadn’t been on the pitch for a long time,” he added.

“I trained little by little with the group and felt good. That’s why we decided that I would start. I’m very happy with it.”

Elsewhere, LA Galaxy fought back from a two-goal deficit to beat Los Angeles rivals LAFC 4-2, pitting the top two teams in the Western Conference against each other.