While the Argentine lights up South Beach, the Sheffield-born striker is making waves in Hollywood as he tries to save a season
Imagine this: after a gruelling European season, a 30-something-year-old attacker arrives in MLS, joining a big-market team that is very much down and very much out. The hope is gone, the season unsalvageable.
But goals start flowing, points begin to pile up, hope slowly starts to return. Not a crazy amount of hope, mind you, but a fool's hope. The season may not be dead, the playoffs may not be out of reach and, perhaps most importantly, there's a reason to finally be excited about what's going on.
This could all be used to describe Lionel Messi's heroics in Miami, and that would be correct. But that would be too obvious, wouldn't it? It may sound wild, and it certainly feels crazy to say, but the player we're talking about here is Billy Sharp.
Yes, Billy Sharp. The Sheffield United mainstay. The player who's journey has taken him to Rotherham, Sheffield, Southampton, Nottingham, Reading, Leeds and just about everywhere else a player can play in England. The player that, at least in some circles, is best known for pissing off Wrexham. The player who is the Championship's all-time leading goalscorer. The player who, at one point, had scored more goals than any other English-born player in the 21st century.
Sharp arrived in Los Angeles this season and, in the weeks since, has brought something magical to the LA Galaxy. No, he's not Messi, and it's ridiculous to make the comparison. Messi is perhaps the greatest of all time, a player that has changed a club and a league since he arrived in South Florida.
On the other coast, though, Sharp has been creating something special, too. With the 37-year-old striker leading the charge, the Galaxy aren't dead yet.
Getty ImagesA winding road to LA
Before you can understand exactly what Sharp has done since arriving in LA, you first have to understand a few other things. The first of those is Sharp's road to Hollywood.
Born in Sheffield, the striker is a legit hero for his hometown club, having scored 129 goals over his two stints across three different leagues. His most recent spell lasted eight whole years, with him scoring 116 goals across 311 games to fire the club to multiple promotions all the way to the Premier League.
He was the club's Player of the Year twice and was named League One Player of the Year all the way back in 2006-07. A decade later, he scored 30 goals and added eight assists to earn the League One Golden Boot.
Sharp, in short, is a player who has scored at every level in England. But, after the 2022-23 season, his time with the Blades came to an abrupt end as he was released by the club.
“I got told I was getting one more year,” Sharp told . “I wanted to go into the Premier League with everybody knowing it was my last year, and then it was up to me whether I’d retire after that. I had my heart set on coming back to play the Premier League and committing to playing whatever minutes it would be. When that opportunity didn’t come, it was difficult to digest.”
The Galaxy, meanwhile, came calling in the summer, and they'll be glad they did.
AdvertisementGetty ImagesA tough year for the Galaxy
The second thing you have to understand about Sharp's magic, before we even really get into it, is just how bad the Galaxy were when he walked in. It was a season that was bad from the start, with the campaign beginning with fan protests against the front office, leading to Chris Klein's inevitable firing in May.
It took nearly two months for the Galaxy to get their first win of the season. By mid-June, they had just three. And it was at that point that they lost their superstar, Javier 'Chicharito' Hernandez, to an ACL injury. The season, at that point, was all but doomed.
Douglas Costa, the club's other big name, has been largely absent, failing to score while missing several recent games due to injury. For most of the campaign, the Galaxy have been without any sort of contributions from their Designated Players and, in MLS, that spells disaster.
On August 15, the Galaxy announced Sharp's arrival on a two-month contract with an option for another year. It was a solid, veteran option to cover up what was lacking in Chicharito's absence. At the time, the Galaxy were way out of the playoff picture and fresh off a brief Leagues Cup run that ended in just two group stage games.
What looked like a stopgap signing, though, turned into something much, much more incredible the moment Sharp got going.
Sharp goes off
And now the fun part: what's happened since Sharp arrived.
Well, it began with a goal, of course, on his debut. After coming on as a substitute against the Chicago Fire, Sharp scored from the penalty spot, helping to seal a 3-0 win.
After two substitute appearances without a goal, Sharp scored yet again on September 10, leading the way in 2-2 draw with St. Louis City SC. And it was at that point that he really got going for the Galaxy.
His first start was marked with a goal, although the Galaxy lost El Trafico to rivals LAFC. And then came his best game yet: a ridiculous hat-trick in a potentially season-defining 4-3 win over Minnesota United.
The first goal was a tap-in, a follow-up of a rebound on a shot from Riqui Puig. With his side down 3-1, Sharp then got his second, a real poacher's goal from a corner kick. And then the third, another stroke of luck, as the ball fell to him just outside the six-yard box, with Sharp making no mistake.
"I promised my two kids I'd get one of these [game ball] in my time here so I managed to do that," Sharp said after the hat-trick. "I wanted to come here to score goals. Yeah I'm 37 but I still got a lot of life left in me and a lot of goals."
In total, Sharp has six goals and an assist across his first seven MLS appearances. He's created seven goals in just 335 minutes. It's a ridiculous return, even from a proven goal-scorer, and those sorts of numbers now have the Galaxy dreaming of a miracle.
LA GalaxyHeld in high regard
One of the things that made Sharp such a good stopgap signing for the Galaxy was that there was no mystery to him. There's decades of data here for all to see. When you look at Sharp and what he brings to the game, you know what you'll be getting: goals, oftentimes in bunches.
“An experienced striker who scored a ton of goals,” head coach Greg Vanney said of Sharp. “One thing that I had heard about him and read about him as we were going through this process is the type of leadership that he brings to a locker room and to a team.
“For us, it was a who we felt could be as plug-and-play as you could possibly get from outside of the league because of his experiences, because of the nature and the challenges of the different levels that he has played at and also because of the humility that he brings to a team and to a locker room.”
Prior to Sharp's arrival, the Galaxy definitely needed a goal-scorer. He's played just 300 minutes, but the English striker is already the club's joint-second-leading scorer, tied with winger Tyler Boyd and just one behind midfield star Riqui Puig. That bears repeating: Sharp didn't debut until September, and there's a legitimate chance that, with five games remaining, he could finish as the club's top marksman.
“He gave us a lifeline, obviously," said his Galaxy team-mate Raheem Edwards. "We were kind of depleted right now for goals and this is a guy who is obviously experienced. He knows where to be."
Diego Fagundez added: "We all know he's a goal-scorer. We see it in training, we see it all the time, he's been scoring and that is what is nice to see when you have a number nine that feels confidence in the box and scoring goals it's amazing."