Yannick Bright's surprising rise has been a boost to Lionel Messi's Inter Miami in MLS run

It took three days of 11vs11s for Yannick Bright to stand out. Fifty players showed up to a soccer complex in Milan, all with a dream of having the opportunity to play professionally. Bright, for his part, was far removed from the top of the game in his native Milan. At the time, the defensive midfielder was playing fourth division ball. His brother, 21-year-old AC Milan prospect Kevin, was the one who was expected to make it big. Yannick, on the other hand, was focused on impressing college scouts for a scholarship.

“With me and my brother it has always been a competition… when he was in Milan and I was in the fourth division, and I really wasn’t playing that much, I wasn’t thinking about playing pro. I was thinking about studying and fighting my way through universities,” Bright told GOAL.

But Bright showed up all the same, enticed by the fact that the United States could offer him the chance to pursue his hobby, and also get the kind of education that would support him further down the line.

“I’m not gonna lie, at the time I wasn’t that informed about college soccer that much,” Bright said. “I just saw United States, where I could play soccer and study at the same time, and was like ‘that sounds great.’”

His mentality at the time was basic: keep it tidy, win his 50/50 duels. Let everyone else do the fancy stuff, Bright knew he could stand out by doing exactly what he was good at.

And University of New Hampshire took notice. The Wildcats assistant coach Rich Weinrebe had ventured to Milan to watch a different player, but after a few days of watching Bright hold his own in central midfield, he knew he had someone to show to his head coach. Mark Hubbard, then in the top role at the program, agreed.

“He struck as someone who had the right athletic tools to match the way we play. He was very mature and quick to respond to things… we knew he had a good handle on wanting to come over here and give it a go,” Hubbard said.

Bright’s English wasn’t awful when he arrived in New England - but it was certainly a limiting factor, he admitted. He struggled through classes at first, unable to follow lectures and often stuck in his room due to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“At the time I was pretty much locked in my dorm. It was just dorm, class, field. There wasn’t much social time,” he said.

But once it came to doing all of the right thing on the pitch, Bright flourished. He could tell early on, in fact, that college soccer could be a fruitful pursuit.

“After a couple weeks, I was like ‘I got this’,” Bright said.

He was right. Despite playing outside of a traditionally strong college conference, New Hampshire have surged in national landscape in recent years. Under Hubbard’s leadership, they made four straight NCAA Tournament appearances, and won four America East conference titles, and four conference tournament titles.

Bright was at the forefront of that success throughout.

“It was clear from the beginning that he was a hunter, and someone who really prided himself in defending and winning those battles. That was something that really excited us,” Hubbard said.

And then there were the academics. For a long time, Yannick was always known for doing well in classes, with his younger brother Kevin the more talented footballer. Now both are now in the professional game and Yannick managed to still live up to academic expectations. He majored in finance, graduated Cum Laude, while fitting three and a half years of college into three years.

“The secret of college is to pay attention in class. If you pay attention, I swear it’s like 80 percent of the work,” Bright joked.

Bright even had a backup plan in place. During his time with USL League Two side North Carolina Fusion U23, Bright stayed with a host family, who helped him secure an internship. If the whole soccer thing didn’t work out, there were certainly options. But Bright’s success means he was considered a draft-level prospect for MLS – the top league in the U.S. and Canada.

Bright had little idea as to who might draft him, even as it became clear that he would be a top MLS prospect. There were a few conversations at the draft combine, he admitted, but many of them centered around how his dear Milan were performing.

“Until the draft pick comes out, you don’t know anything,” he admitted.

He was eventually drafted with the 15th overall pick in 2024 by Miami, and walked into a team featuring some of the biggest stars in the global game. There were still some boxes to check. Bright tidied up the remainder of his school work early, cramming six classes into his final semester in New England. And then the research started.

“I kind of had an idea of who the personnel was, and I was trying to look for the kind of people who had my style of play, and how much game time they were getting,” Bright said.

And in the early goings, Bright’s chances were few and far between. He made just seven appearances, and two starts, across the first three months of the season.

Manager Martino later admitted that Bright was originally brought to the club to develop with the second team.

“Sometimes they’ve played a few minutes, sometimes entire games, sometimes a while, but they are ready for these moments. In fact, they came here to play primarily for the second team, and today they find themselves playing a lot of minutes for the First Team… they understand their situation within the team and the answers in moments that are needed,” the Argentine said after a June win over Philadelphia in which Bright provided a crucial assist.

This has been a thing of merit, though. Miami’s system has evolved over the course of the season, and Bright has been one of the primary beneficiaries. With Busquets holding at the base of midfield, and the hyper-active Federico Redondo playing in front of him, Bright does all of the dirty work. The results have made for fine reading. He is among MLS’s leaders in interceptions, while his Blocks and Clearance numbers rank in the 97th percentile or above, according to FBRef.

Bright is quick to stress, though, that he will never be Busquets. There are things, though, that can be learned from the former Barcelona great.

“If you try to play like him, you’re not gonna do it. But if I can implement what he knows and what he does into my game, that can be really beneficial for me,” Bright said.

Nor can he quite replicate the skills of another former Blaugrana legend who he so often shares the pitch with. Bright may be Messi’s teammate, but there are still moments when he watches in awe.

“Sometimes he does things that I just have to stop and admire, like everyone else. I remember that game against the Red Bulls when he had five assists and scored a goal… it felt like he was playing at the park with some friends. He was just walking through people,” Bright said.

Bright has now started five of the last seven games for Miami. Overall, he's played in 19 matches for Inter, with nine starts. His Man of the Match performance against Chicago, an industrious 90 minutes in a win, was singled out by his manager as one of the more important showings of the season.

“He is a player who must have intercepted around 12 balls today. You don’t see that much in life. Of course, it was a very notable performance, and then he gave a logical destination for the ball…. He understand the game well, which is fundamental,” Martino said.

Goalkeeper Drake Callender echoed that sentiment.

“For a young player like him, these games are important, especially mid-year. You want to be fit, be ready… I’m really excited to see what he does for the rest of the season,” he said in a post-match press conference.

With Messi out for three months due to the Copa America and subsequent injury, the Herons have adjusted. Bright is now a key player for this team. And now with the Argentine back - and a normal structure is resumed - the former New Hampshire man will still have a part to play.

What, exactly, that is remains to be seen. Bright played 10 minutes in Messi’s first game back last Saturday, but his playing time could depend on opponent and situations. In Bright, Miami has an all-action presence in the middle, a gritty sort of player that has kept them ticking through the summer months. And with the playoffs soon to come, Bright might have the extra edge that Miami needs to grind out results.

“It’s do or die in the playoffs. We’re going to leave it all on the pitch. There’s two teams playing, only one goes through. It’s got to be us. That’s my mentality,” Bright said.