Cristian PAVON, LO CELSO, MERCADO rumored to start for Argentina

By
John
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Argentine sports media TyC Sports have reported that Jorge SAMPAOLI will be making several changes to his starting for eleven for the match against Croatia.

The players received a surprise visit on Sunday from their family members to celebrate fathers day but we do have news regarding the starting eleven.

Players who started the match against Iceland worked in the gym while the rest of the players worked out on the pitch. From what is being reported, Argentina coach Jorge SAMPAOLI is expected to make a few changes in the starting eleven for the match against Croatia on Thursday.

Eduardo SALVIO who started at right-back will be replaced by Gabriel MERCADO. This was one of the most talked about decisions from SAMPAOLI considering SALVIO naturally plays as a right-winger.

The other changes that fans and critics have been screaming about were the choices of Javier MASCHERANO and Lucas BIGLIA in central midfield. Now it seems like, SAMPAOLI may opt for Giovanni LO CELSO to start alongside MASCHERANO.

The other change will see Angel DI MARIA being dropped for Cristian PAVON. Willy CABALLERO, the controversial pick as Argentina’s first choice keeper will continue to keep his place in the starting eleven.

 

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508 Comments

  22. Deffinettly, Kitty, u are absolutle right about critisicising Messi as well as others too ! No player should be immune to criticism even he’s the best ever we have propably seen so far and i don’t think there will ever be another player like him, but unfortunatly even the best make’s misstakes sometimes, more though with argentina than barca, maybe, but it doesnt actually matter at all how he performs with barca but rather how hebperforms with argentina and if he doesnt perform at same level with argentina then it’s first of all clearly a coaching problem, but offcourse there’s is great frustration because of all of those 3 finals argentina lost and maybe other issues also that we simply can’t be aware them all ! He and the rest ofcthe squad must deliver against croatin’s if not then again first come’s the coach and after that then obviously the players who can’t deliver, nothing more to add to this before the croatian game has been played and then we all will see the outcome of result from that game, hopely we will win it ! but i think germans might get in trouble at least against sweden, maybe even against the koreans ? but this doesnt and cant really matter to us because if we want in it all finally this time, then nevermind who we have play against, offcourse there’s is allways so called favourable draws for some teams and wiseversus, but in the end if we want to win this tournament we should just have started to think of our own stuff allredy before the 23 man squad was released made by our coaching team ! but it did’nt happen so here we are now mostly because of that reason and if they were all thinking that semi’s will be good ebough 4 us then i wonder what they are thinking now after that horrible game against iceland which is ok team but still even the big guns have suffered too it ‘s has not really nothing to do with our game at all just rather of their own problems facing much more better opponents that we did ! and for sure they will get better during the tournament at least some of them, but maybe not german’s this time even though they are allways mentally very strong ! But let’s just all of us who truly support argentina and only argentina wish that we will somehow make it happen ? Because after all of those 3 finals after eachother there’s has been only basicly frustration which seems to be just keep onngrowing more, hope to be really wrong of this for argentina’s sake !

    I want to ask the fans who were saying that ARG performance was better comparing to GER’s and BRA’s one thing, if GER and BRA or any other top team perform badly will FIFA allow ARG to qualify out of their group or give the Cup to ARG?

    GER and BRA played better opponents than us; that is very much clearly evident;
    They have comparatively easier opponents to face in next two matches than us;
    Our coach made some blunders and our defence looked very vulnerable; Every time the opponents attacked us we looked like conceding;
    And more over, Messi had an horrible game & he deserves to be criticised for performance against Iceland;
    He looked too tired & disinterested many a times and he is going to face similar situations going forward(man marked by 2 or 3);
    It needs to be ARG team rather than Messi & 10 players; Why the solution has always to be Messi? We have world class players and why aren’t they performing to their potential and why it needs to be a Messi’s team?
    No way our performance was better than GER, BRA or SPAIN so far;

  23. Mascherano need to be dropped . Mascherano plays side pass always,predictive negative passes, less creativity or moving forward with ball,too slow for a 90mins game,lack of vision, awful shooting , it’s painful to watch him in the midfield. Germany has moved on and swenstiger too move on but selfish mascherano not move on and argentina still dependent on him. Politics.

  24. Really,it’s difficult to win with this type of defense and tactics of Sampaoli.I wonder,why is he using Rojo,who is a bench player in ManU as centre back instead of Fazio,regular centre back for Roma?????Also applicable for Biglia,who is very slow and not regular in AC Millan.Another strange decision is to place Salvio as a right back,who is a genuine wing player despite having two genuine right backs (Ansaldi and Mercado) in your team.With this formation 4-2-3-1,i just wonder,wasn’t it possible to place Dybala as right sided inverted winger alongside Messi?????You have to try with your bestie you have,Mr Sampaoli,isn’t it??????

  27. my lineup would:
    . .Armani
    . Merca otam rojo Tagliafico
    . Banega Masch Lo celso
    . . dybala messi
    . .Aguero
    what do you think about this??

  28. I’m no coach but my lineup would be

    Armani
    Ansaldi Ota Rojo Tagliafico

    Mascherano Lo Celso

    Dybala. Messi. Pavon

    Aguero

    I think Messi Dybala can work

  29. Biglia might be a good team player etc…but for me he is not 100% fit..we should have brought in Paredes..But it is too early to criticise argentina..everyone has a bad day….

    I hope Sweden wins against South Korea..it is going to be more pressure for Germany..

  30. At least Brazil and Germany created a lot of chances, they looked like a team. We played slow-motion and hopeless football. Hope Sampaoli makes some changes on time.

    • We have a lot to improve. Agree.
      They have better squad depth & chemistry than us. Agree..

      But on the basis of first round u can’t reach this conclusion. They created a lot of chances because it was both open games. Swiz & Mexico didn’t come to park the bus.. if they played against us like that, i am sure we would have scored more goals & created more.

      • True that. Both Switzerland and Mexico (Especially) played a more open game- chances on both sides.

        Nigeria , with 1 loss already to their name, will hopefully have to play open.This game might end up being high scoring. The bigger worry is Croatia, which is a more tricky game, tactically.

      • I agree, very hard to compare matches due to the different tactics, opponents etc..At this level it will come down to the smallest details. A defensive lapse and a missed penalty obviously cost us. I do believe if we could have held on to the lead a little longer Iceland would have opened up and we probably would have scored some more goals.

      • They created chances when full defenders inside the box! They shot from distance, crossed from wings, heading, …,, not only one but multiple of players did that.

        We have Biglia walking, Aguero sitting still, Di Maria too safe on all of his passes. No movement. In a game like that you need some urgency but they did otherwise.

        • when Iceland did venture out and Argentina won back the ball, Argentina was way too slow in transition and allowed Iceland to get all 11 players behind the ball. I’m still just trying to come to grips with the fact that Sampaoli knew Iceland would play this way and had no better response than what we saw. Poor player selection and tactics. I know I’m an armchair coach and amateur pundit, but that is the whole fun of this site.

          • afa7886: I’m sure you know that quick transition to prevent the opposition adjustment requires speedy attackers, and we don’t have young fast attackers like Germany, Mexico or Brazil. So Sampaoli played up to the resources in his possession. Messi and Aguero are 30+ and not young anymore, same with Di Maria. That was my point when I said we need young players and our squad is too old, everyone was saying experience comes first. You can’t have a counter attack without fast midfielders and attackers, like last world cup when all the folks were 4 years younger.

  32. You guys keep on blaming player, but none of you admitting Iceland were very solid, even better then the 2016 Iceland. Argentina wasn’t played a bad game, they’re looking better fighting as a team, more disciplined, they executed the plan well; there was only 3 negative things about the team, Di Maria is playing for himself, biglia lake of creativity and the plan was a wrong ones.

  34. bilgia should be dropped but not sure why ppl blame him for the draw
    rojo and cabellero also messed up for the goal
    messi missed penalty
    pavon denies penalty
    lack of shots from far

    there are many reasons for the draw not just biglia. the defence had chnaces to rectify this before the goal.

    irony is biglia was probably most suited to croatia game than iceland

  35. On the Iceland game (just from a scoring pattern , and nothing to do with formations or personnel):

    It was a tough game for sure . We had the perfect start against such a team (plays with banks of 5 and 4). We got the early goal (19th min). That opens up the game for us and if we just held concentration and saw the 15-20 mins after that, I believe we’d have made it easier for ourselves. But we ended up conceding within 4 mins of scoring. Check out Iceland’s results from Euros :

    1. vs. Portugal
    Nani – 31st min
    Equalizer – 50th Min

    2. Austria – Iceland scored first and won the game late with Austria chasing.

    3. England:
    Fat Rooney – 4th min
    Iceland equalizer – 6th min

    4. vs Hungary –
    Own goal conceded late by iceland for the draw

    And finally, against France when they got knocked out:
    France scores in the 12th min to open up the game , and Iceland kept chasing from there on.
    France capitalizes – scores again in the 19th, 42nd, 45th min (4-0 and game out of hand)
    Iceland finally get 1 back in the 56th min.
    France gets 1 more in the 59th min (4-1)
    Finally, Iceland get 1 more goal in the 84th min.

    Against such a team, you need to be organized (goes without saying), need a bit of luck – score early (which we did) , and maintain concentration (which we, unfortunately, didn’t). Of course, all this is easier said than done .

    • I think that early score & slow down tempo was there in sampoli’s plan. That’s y he used Biglia.
      Nothing worked. I think Biglia didn’t even realized what was going on.

      • Biglia Banega Rojo came out of injury
        .But Sampaoli brings them in first game .

        Fast football is only medicine now.we were bit slow.Sampaoli should have used Dybala as a Sub and messi as no 9 after 70 minutes…

        Keep faith
        Vamos
        We will win

    • Chill bro nothing happened to messi.
      Everyone on this blog was blaming messi for the draw.
      I just wanted to tell it was just a first match 2 matches are left anything can happen.

  37. Personally I hate the style of football that Iceland play, which means parking a bus. This is not football. And despite that, our defense did not feel safe during the 1st half, which means how weak is our defense. I think the 2nd half masked the real problem of our defense: Salvio and Tagliafico always late, Rojo always far from the ball. Only Maschereno and Otamendi did their job. It seems that Fazio, Mercado and Ansaldi should play. Lo Celso-Maschereno as double pivot, Salvio-Messi-Pavon behind Aguero.

    • LOL!!!!!!! You know what after 7 years of med school and 7 more working as a doctor i have never heard of a ligament fracture, a tear maybe but never a fracture, infact I don’t even understand the science of how a ligament can be fractured.

      • You need to go back to med school , mamoun 🙂 .

        If you eat enough toothpaste, a ligament can get converted to a bone, which , then can obviously get fractured. This is a known fact.

        From Messi’s “El Amigos” circle, Biglia is the man who is tasked with brushing Messi’s teeth daily to keep it sparkly white and compete with the best in the business – Roberto Firmino (Whose pearly whites doubles up as the liverpool airport runway lights over the weekend). Biglia is known for being very generous with the paste applied , and has been using Patanjali paste (Indian Sonly Liv viewers in the blog will get the reference). This is the root cause of Messi’s ligament fracture.

        I’ll see myself out.

        • oooooooooooooh tooth paste!!!! Vick you just blew my mind!!!!!

          Jokes aside if messi were to get injured (god forbid) it may seem like a tragedy at first glance but it may also be a blessing in disguise where our boys start looking onto themselves to make something happen rather than wait for the ‘little fellow’ to do it for them………..or they would just implode like the (far more talented) 1994 team did.

          • 94 WC team was awesome…I can’t believe the talent we had. We should have won that WC! It was there for the taking….but we all know the rest of the story.

  39. Argentina fans should boo whenever biglia and dimaria again plays for argentina (Why they haven’t done during 1st game everyone knows they are liability to the team).They dont deserve to be in the team anymore.

    • both Di Maria and Biglia have passed their prime time, Biglia have just recovered from injury. They are not supposed to be the starting XI only for super subs..

    • Suresh c’mon how can you encourage boo’ing! What kind of fan are you? If they not performing then it’s the managers decision to replace them.

    • We albiceleste fans maybe be passionate and often critical but we’re not like those entitled barnabeau crowds. I for one would hate to see Biglia and Maria (and Rojo, Pipita etc..) out there wearing the blue and white but if they are out there then I will support them and wish for them to prove me wrong and make me eat crow like masch did in the Iceland game.

  40. Brazil and Germany looked very different case to me. Despite the loss, Germany still played like the team know. They were tactically outclassed by an excellent Mexico. I haven’t heard anything about Mexico before the tournament. But their tactics and especially, composure and skill on the ball looked superb. Mexico’s coach fully exploited Kimmich’s attacking game and exposed Germany. But still Germany looked like a team who have another gear to their game and can solve their problems.
    The Brazil game was different. Switzerland played a brave game but they weren’t as good as Mexico. Brazil started brightly but after Coutinho’s goal, they looked like out of ideas. I watched the Serbia game earlier. Serbia is a very solid team defensively. They are also strong in midfield with some big names. The striker isn’t good tho. Brazil will have to play for their lives against Serbia. The infamous 7-1 scoreline will start to creep in their mind and we’ll see how they fare once Serbia put a man to stop the obvious Coutinho strike.

  42. reports saying Sampaoli still not gonna replace biglia and cabellero because of this 3 dick head including sampa we are at mess.how can biglia continue after that blunder and still he is not giving fair chance to young guns.Because of bullshit sampaoli people criticises Messi but main culprit is sampaoli he choose biglia over paredes anyone can ask what is the contribution of biglia and cabellero in this team i will be happy croatia scores 2 goals only then he gonna kick cabellro out we need to score 3 that gonna give us win and get rid of the two worst player.

      • I’m not trying to bash the guy, but can someone please explain to me Biglia’s role and function in the team? I guess he must be doing something right to have been selected by all these coaches over the years? Maybe he is doing some of the dirty DM work that goes unnoticed and I’ve just never really paid much attention to him? I’ve been watching/playing for over 40 years and just haven’t figured him out. It’s almost like he is not even on the field, a very anonymous type of player. I get Masche’s role, and Masche makes his presence known, but Biglia….I don’t really think Biglia or Masche are ideally suited for modern futbol at this level.

  46. Well this WC is going crazy, its better not to expect any team to be winners, Teams like Belgium, Portugal, Croatia, Mexico, Sweden(Always a Giant killer), Switzerland, Poland, Columbia etc are very hard to beat nowadays add to that smaller teams like Iceland, Egypt, etc are also getting better. They have improved so much the traditional Super powers is finding it harder and harder. How many giants will fall in the First Round?? Italy & Netherlands already didn’t qualify which itself was a shocker.

  48. Now i think this blog has become boring and senseless. Everyone has become teacher those who never touched football on his feet all are teaching messi how to play football.

    • Yes. Some Argentina haters (may be supporters of other teams) are trying to dominate this group and support their own teams indirectly. They will run away when we win the world cup. NEGLECT them.

    • Absolutely right bro..here fucking bullshit punditz who are more intelligent then sampoli.technically argentina played very well game.tactics also fine.

      • If we as a fan understand simple logics then why not sampaoli? Why sampaoli keep repeating same mistakes. Don’t you know what maradona said on sampaoli and about his inferior and Coward tactics.???

        • And yet a club like Sevilla and Chelsea wants him as a coach and Maradona’s opinions and skill on coaching is well known to the world.

      • We don’t want to hide our issues behind Germany or Brazil’ failure. We are here to win the trophy. Dreaming about something without understanding ground reality is absurd exceptional.

        • Maradona is clueless, he said out of the ten corners we didn’t utilize short passes.

          Did he watch how many times Lio, Aguero, meza, di Maria etc tried short passes inside the box. It wasn’t Messi alone as you said, he tried his trademark one-two passes with team mates but it’s hella crowded in there. Most of them get blocked, intercepted and cleared.

          Low crosses and coming from behind moves are what needed, as defenders would split their attention between upcoming enemy midfielders/full backs and guarding the strikers. But the passes would need to be delivered from near goal line, that’s why pavon’s ability is required.

          And out of ten, Otamendi alone had at least 2 or 3 in my count. So it wasn’t entirely bad idea at all. He is a predator for aerial balls, like Samuel used to be for Argentina.

          Maradona saying Sampaoli is a bad coach is like opening his 0-4 wound against Germany’10.

  50. If you look in a neutral perspective, Messi and Argentina is more predictable these days. The other teams are not the same as 2014. But our players want to play as same tactics.
    Midfielder like Biglia and Mascheranho can’t join in attack and wingers are not joining in attack when we have possession on another wing. Lavezzi, Di Maria was attacking from wings that’s why Messi getting some space in mid. Defenders are not joining in attack it can be understandable, but how come midfielder fear to join in attack when opponents play like parking bus on their own box.
    Can we expect Biglia or Mascheranho to do the job. Only passing without quick movement is nothing. It can only lead to a lose then draw then sometime fortunate win. You can watch Barcelona matches.

  51. I am sure if we play against Switzerland with that space Messi will destroy them. Mexico’s case is also not different. Some of us (Messi haters) don’t agree it, but our opponents do. . That is why it is said Messi team. Any team would have told it. It does not mean we don’t have other players.
    It is a pity that some of us go a step forward to teach Messi how to take a penalty or free kick ? !!! He has been on top level player for one of the biggest club (BARCELONA) and the NT player for a country like Argentina for more than ten years trained under well known tacticians like Guardiola etc.
    No player in the world is error free and it was an error or fault. That is all. He confessed it. But now some of us are teaching him fundamentals of food ball. !!!

  52. Back four should be solid and Mercado, Fazio, Otamendi and Rojo should play. Last world cup Rojo played as left back. Nobody is questioning Tagliafco. What was his contribution in the game? I felt Tagliafco was worst than Biglia. The most counter attacks and goal was from left side. So remove Tagliafco immediately and play Rojo in that position.

    • Playing Mercado, Fazio, Otamendi, and Rojo will be 4 CB at back…! At least one fullback should be there. Tagliafico is a good player. He deserved a second chance. I think Tagliafico and Meza will be good against Croatia and Nigeria.

        • Lacking height does not mean that a player lacks an aerial ability, perfect example was 5ft8 Danielle Passarella, who was a total beast in the air. Tagliafico is in that mold, he’s short but he’s damn good in the air and there is no universe where I would start Rojo over tagliafico, infact there is no universe where I would use Rojo as anything other than either a waterboy or a ball boy.

          • I agree that lacking height does not mean that a player lacks an aerial ability. Tagliafico is 5 ft 7 in and shorter than Passarella. He didn’t play well in last game and he lacks vision. However, if he is in top XI and plays well, I will be happier.

  53. Pay attention to the two mirroring defense triangles.
    Yesterday’s setting:

    Mascherano-otamendi-Salvio — this is our strong side
    Biglia-rojo-tagliafico — this is our weak side, especially biglia and Rojo.
    And the goal is due to the weakness of this side, other than Willy’s shaky block.

    Replacing Biglia with lo Celso is enough? I say Rojo needs to be replaced too, by Fazio ?

    • This. Most of whatevee Iceland did attacking wise came in from the left side of the defence. They saw a weakness and exploited it, and we struggled to cope.

      Croatia’s key line of attack is the modric-perisic-mandzukic combo. Mandzukic is a pest in the box and perisic offers very good width and strength. Might make sense to have fazio to cope with the Ariel threat, but I’m not pitbull I mean sampaoli.

      On the attacking front , we looked a little lost for ideas . I think the remaining two games suit us a bit better in terms of space offeres. Pavon would have been the better choice against Iceland as he maintains width and can spread out the defense more. Lo celso would offer the desperately needed mobility in midfield. The Iceland game wasn’t a good guage for double pivots at all as they weren’t tested much defensively , and offeres zero creativity in terms of passing through lines or over the top.

      • I have rewatched the game.

        Actually Iceland attacked more from our right side, where Salvio and Otamendi is in it, but it is a solid wall, they couldn’t penetrate this side. That’s why Salvio has quite a number of tackles, interception and clearance. So did Otamendi. It’s the busiest area of our defense.

        While on the other side, left side of our defense rarely get attacked but it’s already looked fragile on some occasion. This explained why Tagli has zero interception, tackle and clearance.

        I have little doubt on our defense strength on the right side, but now that Sampa has decided to change Salvio, I don’t know anymore.

        See the heatmap if anyone interested. Heatmap, possesion stats, and number of passes all indicate the limited area where Iceland take shelter. Compare it with Mexico and Swiss heat maps, you’ll get the idea. Argentina, on the opposite, has tried all, be it left, center, right side, but it’s really difficult to get an open goal scoring path.

        Compare with Brazil or Germany who prefer either left or right side of the flank, they target one side thinking it’s their stronger side, but as a result they were surrounded by more players from the opponent side as well. Mexico did really well with Gallardo, in particular, well according to stat (didn’t watch that game). And Neymar… Getting pulled more than twice, tackled etc. It’s a hard day for him.

        • Nice, thanks for the note FF.0. I’ve been trying to find the heatmaps but haven’t gotten a good source yet.

          I was referring to the dangerous opps – all seem to be skewed from the left side of the defence. The total posession or area of icelandic posession may have been on the right side, which, like you pointed out, seemed to be managed well with the combo of salvio-otamendi-masche.

    • It was proved in last club season that Rojo played less for MANUcoming out of injury ,sometimes out of squad evenwhen he was fit.But Fazio played the whole season and a very good season for Roma.Fazio did really well to win WC spot.

      Only cause for Rojo > Fazio
      Is Rojo got experience of WC ….

      Just the first game
      Hope we will come back stronger against Croatia..specifically if they don’t park the bus..

      Personally I prefer the same team to start except Biglia (banega)
      Meza (Lo celso)
      Pavon (dimaria)

      As a Sub Dybala must have to come in

  54. Playing dybala instead of meza ia a must plus fixing the crappy defence and never play biglia again .Mercado instead of salvio for balance .
    I still cant believe that dybala and messi cant play together. Its very stupid .

    • Salvio has done well imo. He was together with Otamendi, helped by Mascherano, has sealed the right side, where most Iceland attacks coming from. But I don’t know about Mercado current condition. Coach knows better.

      It’s the left side that needs strengthening, especially imo the line which biglia and Rojo are standing. It’s highly vulnerable.

  55. Messi should not bear all the responsibilities……Kun may take the penalties……Dybala should be on the pitch instead of Meza and he may take the free kicks …..messi may play as the play maker……

  56. The team also need a mental setup. They should imagine they are in the Final and luckily its Croatia. Have to win it for the crown. And same goes with Nigeria. We should play 6 Finals taking one opponent at a time with intensity and be ruthless.

  57. I want to ask the fans who were saying that ARG performance was better comparing to GER’s and BRA’s one thing, if GER and BRA or any other top team perform badly will FIFA allow ARG to qualify out of their group or give the Cup to ARG?

    GER and BRA played better opponents than us; that is very much clearly evident;
    They have comparatively easier opponents to face in next two matches than us;
    Our coach made some blunders and our defence looked very vulnerable; Every time the opponents attacked us we looked like conceding;
    And more over, Messi had an horrible game & he deserves to be criticised for performance against Iceland;
    He looked too tired & disinterested many a times and he is going to face similar situations going forward(man marked by 2 or 3);
    It needs to be ARG team rather than Messi & 10 players; Why the solution has always to be Messi? We have world class players and why aren’t they performing to their potential and why it needs to be a Messi’s team?
    No way our performance was better than GER, BRA or SPAIN so far;

      • Agree. I felt good and somewhat comforted by Germany’s loss and Brazil’s draw but that feeling only lasted a second or two. We have to focus and concentrate on our own matches against CRO and NIG.

    • I’m not saying Argentina’s defense was good. If it was good, it will be 1-0 for us. All I am saying Iceland played more negative football and Swiss and ‘probably’ Mexico aren’t (I didn’t watch Germany, made no comment about them, but looking at reviews and who win the game….). But I watched Brazil and it’s clear.

      Iceland pack players, it’s a dense structure, and therefore it’s really solid, whatever team would work hard to even get the ball at their penalty.

      Using the wing will be hard too considering their height and mass. It require a special kind of treatment like mass movement of players coming from behind and providing low cross or low backward cross (look what Spain did against Argentina the other day).

    • Technically those teams exceed Iceland by far but other than Iran there is no side better at parking the bus and putting 10 behind the ball at this tournament.

      • I was told years ago that you are only as good as the team you are playing against in that you need to be careful not to be brought down to that teams level. Kudos to Iceland for playing a tight defensive match and capitalizing on one of the few opportunities to score. I don’t think Iceland’s play was pretty, and I believe they dragged Argentina down with them into what was an ugly and awkward game. I believe Argentina will be able to show more of what they are capable of in the next two matches. If Croatia and Nigeria do try to “park the bus” I don’t think they will be as good at it as Iceland, or Iran was in the 2014 WC.

    • I’m too of the opinion that we were not better than GER, ESP and BRA. ESP’s play was extremely fluent, passing and transitions smooth but was up aginst their own lacksidical defending and a hyped up CR7. I felt GER and BRA were playing very intense and high energy relatively fluid football but then they were against opponents who were equally able to provide that same level of energy and performance and more importantly were willing to play ball. Teams against us just park the bus, smother Leo with three guys and that’s all. We can’t seem to break that. Our coaches can’t seem to anticipate that and break that down too. Sigh.

  58. Taking a penalty is an art.
    There’s several way of taking it.
    First, you shot all the way to the high corner, be it left side or right side, with power that is. The chance of keeper nullifying it… Is almost 0%, no matter who and what they do. That if you had it perfectly on target.

    Second, to do it in style, making the keeper go to the wrong direction.. It require the player to somehow make a move that made the keeper going in one direction, while it is actually the other.

    Third one, is to shoot to center. Keepers are required to move instantly they figure out where the penalty taker is going to shoot the ball. If not, even if they guess it right it would be too latr. Shooting to the center made many keeper lose their mind. There’s one chance that the ball hit keeper’s feet,so it’s better to hit it low or high. If it is done with slow chip, it is a panenka. Crazy but wonderful to watch.

    What Messi did yesterday I think was the second type. He failed to trick the goalkeeper by going to the other direction. If not, he should just hit it hard or go to the center. If the penalty was retaken, he must’ve opt to hit it high and corner, though this kind of penalty risk it getting above the post if slightly over hit.

    • Also some physiological preparation. If you have notice Ronaldo takes a long time for breathing in and out, concentrate and visualize the 4 corners of the goal and the goalie size to push him mentally how would he play it and how hard he needs to kick it. No style is guaranteed because every player has misses plus goalie experience and reflexes factor, but some preparations would increase the chance of getting it right.

      • Please email Messi. He wont see this message here. If you guys can find his email address and tell him what is the art of taking Penalties. Maybe he will learn from you guys and wont ever miss a single penalty again. Talents like you guys should not be limited to online threads.

  59. It certainly feels good to see some of the over hyped teams getting what they deserved. Just playing in EPL doesn’t make you best in the world. I want Germany and Spain end up in Brazil and France bracket. Let them deal with each other!! But we can’t relax just because other heavy weights also dropped points .We still have to WIN our next match and to do that Sampaoli has to address these 4 concerns!

    1)Obviously Kick out the useless players like Dimaria ,Biglia and Rojo. Dimaria shouldn’t start and be played on the flanks anymore. He is old and has lost his pace and offers nothing from there. He couldn’t get a single pass or cross right last game. Biglia was playing for Iceland against us yesterday. I have nothing to say against Salvio. He is not a natural right back. Sampa needs to make these necessary changes and if we are to believe the media reports the changes Sampa is going to make are Lo-celso for Biglia,Mercado for Salvio and Pavon for Dimaria. I was hoping he was done experimenting with Rojo and finally Fazio will play and Ansaldi will also get a nod but nevertheless these 3 changes are definite upgrades.

    2) If things are not going according to plan Sampa can’t just be a spectator and hope that his starting XI who did nothing for 60 mins will somehow come up with something in the next 30 mins. His timing of subs were very shocking!! He is suppose to change his tactics if plan A doesn’t work and not just stand there with teary red eyes and watch with horror!!

    3)With Pavon,Meza and Locelso in the starting XI Messi should play closer to the goal in the box drawing fouls like Ronaldo !! How many times was Messi in the box last game??? If Messi plays inside the box and Pavon and Meza supplying crosses I can guarantee opponent defenders will bring Messi down. We couldn’t create nothing with Messi hovering just outside the box and hopelessly shooting long range shots. Also everything can’t go through Messi all the time, it will make our attack look very predictable and easy for the opponent to shut us off. They will heavily mark Messi and force him to lose the possession of the ball and counter attack us. Messi has to pass the ball to those who are in better position not just to Aguero or Dimaria.

    4)There is no doubt that Croatia will sit back and attack on counters . Sampa can’t have the whole team go on full attack mode like against Iceland and when the opponent counter attacks our defenders all run back and collect in-front of the goalkeeper leaving the opponent’s attackers unmarked in our box. We can’t afford to have our shaky goalkeeper face the firing squad . Croatia has game changers like Modric & Mandzukic and some decent players like Rakitic and Perisic. We have to have some kind of plans for these players. If their wings aren’t clipped these players will hurt us. I can’t stress enough how important is it to make sure Modric and Mandzukic have a off game against us. If these two flop we will win!!!

    • Good points Croatia will be much more dangerous than Iceland on the counter we cannot afford any defensive mistakes I saw the game from 2014 though it was a friendly against them I think we can beat them if we don’t waste our chances ,in that game Messi scored a penalty!

  60. There is one problem we face because we have Messi. Teams are too scared to give us space. Germany, Brazil and Spain put less fear in Defenders than Messi alone. Teams only park bus against us. Because no other players can do what Messi can and it is evident by teams parking bus against us. Not even Ronaldo. If Ronaldo did not score those Penalty and the Free kick he would have only 1 goal which was also a luck. The same swiss team who gave Brazil some room would fear more when they face us and they would concentrate more on Messi than attack. No teams has what we have and no one can do what Messi does. Messi is also our defence technically or else we would have concede more goals with our poor defence. Take A bow for Messi. We are lucky he is Argentine. And we dare not criticise Messi cos we would have not been here at the first place. And we still dream of winning because we have him. So SHUT THE FUCK UP (i usually dont use these words sorry for that) when thinking about criticising him. Do not be an ungrateful moron please 🙏. He is the only only who can take us forward with some team support and luck. Wake up idiots. (Sorry again)
    Vamos Albiceleste Vamos Leo.

  61. Very disappointed with draw but everything happens for reasons. Portugal were same like this in Euro but ended up winning the tournament. We just need to give more and be clam. Passing through group is necessary and we can beat anyone with little bit of luck.

  62. those who thought they have better idea than sampaoli then go and manage argentina.

  64. I really liked the way we played against Iceland, we pressed really hard. Young players showed their potential and were unpredictable and dangerous, so if we raise the level just a bit in our next game, we will win easily.

      • Key is Messi should be upfront. Iceland match he was virtually in center line. With the 3 tweaks, I still believe we will dispose Croatia. But the worry is goalkeeper.

  65. This 4-2-3-1 going forward
    And 4-4-2 in transition.
    I wish Dybala could be included
    But it would alter the team in transition…mesa and pavon offer a lot of defensive help you don’t get from messi di maria.

    • Right bro..bt in mundo, there are lot of idiots in this group.they are fucking ashole.they blame messi. this is true.he is humen . didn’t forget argentina reach world cup due to messi’ s last match hardic .idiot think they are smarter then sampoli..they hve great knowledge of football.o overall argentina played very well against Iceland .this is a football.

  67. Around all the big names, seems like only Spain and Brazil delivered decent performance despite their draw. Quite normal that Neymar didn’t do well after 4 months of not playing. I expect to see a great Belgium team.

    • Neymar played well. He was trying to hard but was still excellent. Brasil got cocky, they had the game totally in control, scored early and then got waaaaaaay to relaxed. They had a false sense of confidence.. and the swiss made them pay.. they then tried to catch up but the swiss defended well. Brasil however is a mighty team this cup, and if they stay focused they can beat anyone.. with or without Neymar. Something we cant claim.

    • Bro argentina played very well against Iceland.if messi score and we got pavan penalty’s.match scenario will changed.argentina dominate alll time.iceland all player play like defender.

    • The match between Brazil and Swiss is more even than Argentina vs Iceland. Specificly after Coutinho’s goal. Even after Swiss level they keep looking for a win.

      Look at Swiss possession and passes. Shaqiri made Marcelo look ugly at times.
      And yet their right side in particular are able to defend well, lichtsteiner, behrami and schar to be exact. They played with speed and amazing stamina. No wonder they’re six at FIFA ranking if I’m not mistaken.

      I think if we faced Swiss we have a bigger chance in winning. They didn’t park the bus. And Brazil didn’t play that great yesterday. We have about the same number of chances with a parking team than them with a near open team.

  68. Germany lost Spain drew Portugal drew Brazil drew. Out of the strong teams, only Uruguay and France won. I fail to understand why media attention is focussed just on Argentina and Messi tying. I get it that Cristiano scored a hattrick against Spain but I feel it could have been a lot worse and Argentina could have lost the game. If Iran somehow beat Portugal and tie Spain- Portugal might not even make it to 16, although I doubt that would happen. I hope Portugal finishes second so Uruguay can take care of them. Argentina has it in them to beat Spain. Also, if Brazil meet Germany in last-16, that would be awesome. In such competitions, it is all about who meets who.

  71. As someone said earlier, our knockout stage has started already. We cannot let any of our opponents from here on take away any points from us… time for us to get with the program, grow a pair each and get our hearts and heads into each game.

    I hope sampi realizes he is building a team for the real knockouts now and the more our youngsters get play time and positive touches on the ball there less their WC inexperience will matter and the more confidence they will have when it counts the most. Pavon, dybala, meza.

    Vamos Argentina!

  74. Guys, are they dropping Di Maria? Will Pavon take his place or they both will play and Meza is out? I’m confused. The line up on top doesn’t include Di Maria, but Pavon and LoCelso will be there plus Mercadi instead of Salvio. Though I thought Salvio did a decent job, not bad at all, also he has a good physique.

  75. Brazil and Germany can go suck it, I dont care. I just care that from now on whoever comes our way we beat them. The Knock outs started for us. I dont care Which bracket Brazil or Germany end up cos by seeing there game i am not worried about them. I sm worried about our starting X1 and formation cos I believe with the right mix of players and strategy we can beat anyone in this WC. To me Spain looks strong but beatable. So lets get Pavon, Lo Celso in. Give Dybala a chance in the 60s and Keep Dimaria as super sub when opposition is tired. I dont want to Change Caballero cos we dont know how Armani will react. And Mashcherano after watching the first game i think he should stay cos he was a leader in the back. But no Biglia please. We dont have a better player than Mash in DM.
    Vamos

  76. Now What?? Now what??? I just finished watching Brazil beat Switzerland 1-1, as I recorded. Yeah that’s right, that’s what I said the other day about my beloved Argentina and some mocked me. Yes we beat Iceland 1-1. You want to argue with me ?? Go ahead do it and then put yourself in Germany, and their fans, shoes. There is a reason why Brazil, Argentina, Germany and Italy are always, except in 2010, and taken collectively, in The Final. You can add Spain and France in that groupe now. Comparatively these teams have more overall capacity(including experience and history) thanall others do not have. And all those others eventually flame out. But before that, and especially early, it is very very difficult to play against them. So the minimum you can do is get at least a point. I said Argentina did ok by me, against the ugliest of opponents, the most negative team anyone has faced so far. Now what?? Are Brazil and Germany going to be eliminated in the first round?? Of course no. Why?? Because, and just like Argentina, they have différents gears. Argentina will make change, adjust, go into another gear and move on from there. Argentina beat Iceland 1-1, heck yeah, I prefer my situation than that of Germans fans. Vamos Argentina!!

    • You make some good points. Iceland does play like a bunch of neurotic schizophrenic insecure teens but no reason we shouldn’t have beat their ass down to pulp.
      I bet you’d be singing a different tune had messi not missed the penalty.

  77. i think it will be a more open game against croatia!! the sad thing is we see these team like switzerland having 8 or 9 players in their own box.

    • Mascherano and di Maria need to be dropped . Mascherano plays sidepass always I’ll say negative passes, less creativity,mobility, comitting dangerous freekicks

      • Mascherano and di Maria need to be dropped . Mascherano plays sidepass always I’ll say negative passes, less creativity,mobility, comitting dangerous freekicks Mascherano and di Maria need to be dropped . Mascherano plays sidepass always I’ll say negative passes, less creativity,mobility, Mascherano and di Maria need to be dropped . Mascherano plays sidepass always I’ll say negative passes, less creativity,mobility, comitting dangerous freekicks comitting dangerous freekicks Mascherano and di Maria need to be dropped . Mascherano plays sidepass always I’ll say negative passes, less creativity,mobility, comitting dangerous freekicks Mascherano and di Maria need to be dropped . Mascherano plays sidepass always I’ll say negative passes, less creativity,mobility, comitting dangerous freekicks

        • No one has stepped up to replace Mascherano. You can name drop Pizarro, Biglia, Krane, Paredes, etc, etc and none have shown to be an improvement. Ascibar (spelling?) looks promising.. but Mascherano, even at the end of his carreer is still the most tenatious, hard tackling, consistent and experienced LEADER we have for that position. So until someone starts to show otherwise day in and out, surround him with good players and put the blame on the collective. He did his job vs Iceland..

          DiMaria IS one to bench. Pavon, Perotti, etc are all more than ready to replace him. Personally, I still think Fideo has a place in the team, but NOT as a wide winger, he is useless there unless there is room for him to run. I think Dimarias best position for Argentina is central, next to Messi, to help build up play. DiMaria is the onlly player other than Messi that has the talent to open up a game.. he needs to be our “Isco”.. but I dont think the Coach is going to do that, and Fideo is too much of an idiot to see it himself. Lets put our hope with Pavon and Mesa.

          Biglia should sit and Locelso should start. Even Enzo is a better option than Biglia. Biglia should only play as Mascheranos sub.

    • My friend they will always, always, play like that. Iceland have no talents, to the level of Argentina and they know it very well. So, so, if they dare play an open game against Messi and Argentina they will be crushed. At least five goals. Brazil and Germany had, actually, more open spaces than Argentina who had none. So all these teams cannot compete on an equal footing with the top top, you will get crushed.

    • Switzerland always have at least 2 players in Brazil’s half when Brazil start attacking. They play high pessure. Go rewatch the game.

      After the second half Iceland barely put anyone at our half, except when attacking. They park the bus.

      That’s the difference.

  78. Fuck all those so called fans who attacked Messi for missing the penalty and poor result. Take the result from Germany match and bra match so far.

    If Iceland could not attack that was coz they surrounded Messi with 4 players. Neymar meanwhile is given free run and still can’t do much. These d*****d fans couldn’t even remember it was Messi who single handedly brought us to this world cup by scoring the hat trick against Ecuador.

    Some fucking fans even said Messi can’t take pressure. Did they even watch his games? Leave matches for Barca. Did they watch Ecuador match atleast. Most crucial match, away game and the opposition team scores a goal in the first min, Messi and all players were under huge pressure. I don’t think I’ve felt so much tension ever. A world cup without Argentina that too in the Messi era was unthinkable for me. People would just ignore the fact that Messi missed a lot of games and will blame Messi. Not just Messi haters, some so called Argentina fans would want his blood.

    They wanted Messi to retire now so that Argentina can start winning world cups again. Lol.

    I saw some people even comparing Argentina’s result with Brazil’s 7up against Germany. That the draw was more like a loss.

    We have a fucking squad and when we don’t perform, Messi is to blame. If Messi can get the 4 players that Brazil has its on the bench (Ederson – goalie, Marquinhos – DF, Fernandinho – DM, Douglas Costa – LW), he will bring the world cup for Argentina. That’s for sure.

    Messi will atleast make sure Argentina can compete in the world cup if Sampaoli can do what we all expected. Setup a team to support Messi along with a plan B (if plan A doesn’t work). Play Lo Celso instead of Bigilia. Fazio instead of Rojo. Pavon instead of DiMaria. Armani instead of Caballero.

    It’s a shame Dybala can’t take Meza’s spot being a better talented player. But people again blame Messi for the same. They forget the fact that it was Dybala’s fault. He said he thinks he can’t complement Messi. He wasn’t ready to compromise his game and take another position as Coutinho done. I think he may be ready at this time, but it was late. Hope its still not too late. He was also a little cocky when he said that coz he was on a terrific form at that time and Allegri even compared him with Messi. But since then his performance dropped and he came back to Earth. Allegri confessed that he shouldn’t have made that Messi comparison.

    Hey you fools, if Messi doesn’t want Dybala, would he have got a place in the squad?

    What’s even more funny is as I read in TycSports, when there was a report that the match was cancelled as per the request from Messi, one Argentina support staff personal said that Messi doesn’t involve anything whether it’s a match schedule or team selection. He is only interested in football on the pitch.

    He publicly says his desire and praise some players like he said Barca need players like Greizmann for CL. (Yet some moron here said Messi doesn’t want Greizmann to come to Barca). He praised that he got a new partner in Pavon.

    • people always need someone to blame, but at end of day it’s a team sport, play as a team win as a team and lose as a team. Only thing i will say is that it’s sometimes better to let others take penalty kick especially when u are a bit flustered. i think people need to move out of the past, this is not the age of maradona or riquelme in those days there were easy teams that u knew u could trounce… now nearly every team in wc is decent.. we will get through regardless of who we face… have faith.

      • In Maradona’s time we didn’t dominate. We mostly scraped past. Sometimes due to the brilliance of Maradona and at other times other players chipped in.

        Just how it’s happening with Messi.

        • yes but there were always teams that weren’t technically as good or skillful as there are now.. and can’t remember ever having a really easy group phase

          • I agree Daystar. Also WC structure was different, 24 teams only so 4 of the best 3rd team can qualify to knock out stage. It’s getting tougher now and with having 48 teams in 2026 teams like Italy , Netherlands or Chile would be qualified and make competition even tougher.

      • I don’t think they are decent, they are not. As I’ve been saying it, it’s a tactical adjustment that smaller teams make. If in fact they play openly against Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Spain or France, then they will take 4,5 or even six goals. They are not that decent they just adjust to playing with very close systems so as not to take in too many goals.

        • they didn’t just defend they scored too and they did so vs england croatia etc so to say they are not a decent side would be wrong….

    • The issue with Dybala is not talent. Its not Messi. Its not even that they overlap positions.. the issue is that Dybala DOES NOT RUN in defense. He is a luxury player, and you can only field so many of those. Kun.. Messi.. thats it. Everyone else needs to be able and willing to bust a lung box to box for 90 minutes. Dybala wont and cant. Mesa, while less talented will. That is why he starts. That is why Lanzini would have.. or Pavon.. even Dimaria.. Locelso.. etc.

      Dybala can only play for us if Messi is not on the field, or he subs in for Kun.. or if the coach decides to play a 442 with Dybala upfront and Messi as a #10. Personally, Id do that in a heart beat. And I would play Higuain (even though Kun is better), simply because Dybala knows Higuain well at Juve and I think collectively Pipita + Dybala is greater than Kun + Dybala.

      ……… Higuain…. Dybala………
      Pavon………..Messi………. LoCelso
      ——————–Masch—————-
      –Tagla—–Ota——-Mercado——Ansaldi

      is what I would field.

    • I think it’s our left side that need to be strengthen. I’m not sure though, but from goals against Spain and yesterday, it’s coming from the left back failed to anticipate dangerous cross. The center defending is also awful though, with only Otamendi that did a great job. Fazio should replace Rojo.

      In summary, there’s a lot of defending homework to do.

    • Well said. These morons had broken all the leveks of decency even before the kick off. Do you think these shit heads will spare Messi especially after the penalty miss, especially when these shit heads think Argentina was winning world cup after world cup till 2006 when messi started playing.

  79. Forget Germany loss and Brazil tie for a second..HAHAHA at the Media pundits, they all have egg on their faces. Those JOKES over at ESPN can go weep with Brazil and Germany now..Haha, I’m laughing more at the media pundits than anything else..I’m better at punditry than these guys. I went on ESPN several weeks ago and said Mexico would win over Germany and they attack me like a swarm of hornets. I predicted here that Switzerland would top the group people came at me hard..I predicted Iran would make the round of 16 and people laugh at me, now Iran just need two draw games to top the group..Iran for me has the best coach at the world cup in Carlos Queiroz..Hopefully Argentina can still end up winning the group.My dream scenario; Uruguay top and Russia second. Iran top and Spain/Portugal 2nd. Argentina top their group, win in the round of 16 and will play either Iran or Russia, any of these team would be tough quarterfinal opponent, but I’ll take them as an easier route to the semis..Again, let’s all have a laugh at the media pundits, both their sweet hearts flopped today..How is that favorite tag going Brazil and Germany?

    As for Argentina, STOP being SCARE and SHAKY..STOP being SCARED of your opponents especially the not so prestigious world cup nations. Play with more heart and STOP the SHAKY nonsense on the football pitch, you guys can do better..STOP playing like scary cats for a change!! Stop the panicking display, I’m tired of seeing this from Argentina..Messi you had all the rest in the world, remember, ”thank goodness Barcelona is out of the UCL?” Yes, Messi needed to blast that pk straight down the middle or in the goalkeeper left side of the net. Messi took the same pk against Haiti and the keeper almost save it. The last pk Messi took before the world cu was against Haiti and he had to anticipate that the Iceland keeper reviewed his pk against Haiti..Messi and all the players need to dig deep and stop playing with fear. Stop this Shaky and scary approach on the football pitch, stop selling yourself short, stop telling yourself the opponent is better, stop undercutting your talent on the pitch. Sampaoli need to cut out the emotions on the sideline, when Argentina scored he was celebrating as if it was a world cup final instead of calling over Masche or Otamendi to the sideline to let either one of them know to get organize at the back and in midfield because Iceland might try to get an equalizer. Sampaoli and the players all seem scared, nervous, shaky and unsure of themselves. You’re not going to win the world cup with this mentality. Argentina have plenty of talent, more than enough to win this world cup, but from what I have seen against Iceland, the same old problems are back, the players are too tense and scare..Another thing, cut out the Messi dependency..As I always said, if four players are marking Messi you don’t need to pass the ball to him, use someone else in another position. And Messi, please pass the ball when the wing back make the overlap run instead of ignoring him. I’m a fan of you Messi and I love you man, I want to see you win the world cup, but you need to share the responsibility of the team with your team mates. You could have easily said, Aguero today is your day, here take this pk for your country. You don’t need to put yourself under more pressure Messi, stop listening to the media because they’re all HATERS of you and Argentina, they want to see you fail. Giving the pk to Aguero would show real leadership not weakness in the moment especially you were in a down period at the time.

    I think the team need our support, me attacking Biglia or anyone else doesn’t change the result against Iceland. As I have said before, Argentina have one of the best squad at the world cup, it will come down to how Sampaoli utilize the players in each game.

    • I don’t think Messi can pass the penalty to Aguero unless the latter came forward which I doubt he did.

      Messi wouldn’t mind to pass the penalty if Aguero requested. I’ve seen it in the past.

    • I agree with that part. These kind of penalty thing should be flexible. Depending on their mood, they should decide the kick taker in between them.
      In Barca Messi & Neymar had that understanding between them.. it’s not late. It is good he didn’t miss penalty in a knock out natch & we are out.

  80. In 2014, before the World Cup started, Messi said “avoid us, we are very strong”. He knew that we were very strong in 2014.

    This year, he said “we are not one of the favorites, to reach semis is a good World Cup for us”. He knows his team is not strong this year.

    With that being said, considering most of the 22 of his teammates are mediocre, I have to disagree with most of you actually, for me the key for us to win the World Cup is just one simple thing:

    Messi has to be in “Super Saiyan” mode.

    • u don’t need big name players to win a world cup, u just need 11 decent players who play well together and some luck. And to say that the other 22 are mediocre is really insulting to some of those other players…..

  81. Everyone’s talking about Brazil and Germany, but that’s definitely not going to help..

    I’m so nervous for Thursday and it’s so far away.. I’m watching it with my Croatian brother in law.. I hope sampi changes something, starting with di Maria and biglia

    • Sampaoli just before Iceland game:
      “PAULO (DYBALA) HAS HAD A VERY GRATIFYING PREPARATION FOR US. WE WILL SEE AT WHICH TIME OR IN WHICH MATCH WE CAN USE HIM.”

    • It would be great if Sampaoli introduce Dybala for Meza around the 60th minute against Croatia. Meza is very good but Dybala is one of the best and i hope we will see that he and Messi can finally play together.

    • Read what Messi and Sampaoli said. It was on 27th March:

      Messi:
      “Paulo and I talked about that, what he said is true, for Juventus he plays the same role I do,” Messi told Fox Sports – quoted by Football Italia. “With me in the national team he played further out on the left, which he’s not as used to

      “It’s more difficult for us to play there, I don’t often go out to the left. On the right we can cut in and have the whole pitch in front of us. I understood what he said, there was no need to clarify anything.”

      Sampaoli:
      “It is complicated for Dybala to get used to our system,” Sampaoli said. “We couldn’t improve his performances and we have to evaluate if the current players [in this squad] are better than Paulo or if we have to keep working with Paulo to improve his performance.”

  83. We all knew that our team has problems. Sampaoli under an enormous pressure on his shoulders after taking over the team under a compplete mess and under an insane limited time, he helped the team to advance to the wc and now he is trying to field a team to advance as far as possible, something extremely difficult under these circumstances. The media also new all the above but they put us under a microscope and were enjoying hammering us, spreading shit about us while at the same time they were presenting their favourite boys, Brazil and Germany, as invinsibles.

    So this is for the media and especially for the Brazilian trolls if there are any:
    What about Brazil and Germany now?
    You can kindly go and suck this now!

  84. San isidro, may i ask you what is your oppinion or knowledge about why all the argentinian coaches dont have those balls to tell Messi and the other member of team to follow their coaching instructions ? Why do they all think that Messi is untouchable etc…because everyone should know this and i think Messi know’s this too or is he that arrogant that no one can tell him nothing ? I dont know him personally but for me he allways seems to be very humble and good hearted guy not that arrogant at all like Diego was, maybe ? And deffinetly not that arrogant as criatiano is ! I hate that bastard, sorry to say but every time i see him score or just his face like ramos or marcelo or casemiro they all make me very very angry ! But i have noticed after 3 final losses on a row that Messi’s frustration has grown and maybe also because now he is more older than before and all those tattooees too have suddenly appeared with neymoney and suarez coming to barca !
    But i still belive that he is truly a good human person with good heart but maybe not so humble anymore like before because some years back a ago i would have voted him for world president if there would be such a title on earth, lol ! But do you know how he really is in human terms ? could it really be that he is true boss of everybody and nobody can touch him which make’s him untouchable or is it just that the coaches simply just dont have the balls to tell him dont do this but try this instead ? i know that when pep left barca because of board issues Messi was angry for pep, but i think now he understands why pep left barca ? and there is no more issue between them ? also i know that he allways wanted to bring kun to barca but it never happened, broken promises, maybe i’m not certain but all theese tax issues not only with him but with allmost every player in la liga just shows how corrupt it can get also here in europe, dont worry i wont even dare to speak about corruption in your country, because my uncle’s wife who live’s here in Finland is from the area of Buenos Aires, half spanish and half italian background and she works here in the Uruguan Embassy so in my fathers funeral she told me about 1978 when i was only 2 years old so obviously cant remember that, but spain 1982 and mexico 1986 and italy 1990 i do remember very well because i recorded everytime when argentina played specially in mexico i taped every single game on vhs casettes so i could watch them when ever i wanted and suddenly finnish tv broadcaster started to show serie a games and my best friend was hardcore Napoli fan, half italian half finnish so i used to go his house and watch every game they were broadcasting because he had satellite tv so we could watch also italian broadcast’s ! But now i’m getting myself carried away from my question to you, so sorry about all these nonsense history of my own, but during those times the players did not obviously earn what they earn nowdays and now we come to my point that and which offcourse is just oppinion of my own conclusion’s but i personally think money has been the main issue why argentinian football has suffered so much from those so called good old days when the players respected their countries and valued them more than their clubs nowdays. and because all the economic crisis created mostly by imf and offcourse some very corrupted people from your country too everything seems to still to be at least little bit of in chaos overthere as it’s now coming to everywhere else too so i personally think that this money issue has sadly effected your country way too much( now i’m asume that you are from argentina and sorry if i’m mistaken and in that case i will deeply apoligize for u ! ) not only in economic terms but offcourse footballwise too because in the end everything come’s to money specially nowdays, right ? So could this be the reason why the coaches who have coached recently the national team dont have the balls to tell all these multimillionaires players what to do and how to play as a team because they simply just care for the money and obviously not either follow the instructions from the coaches or the coaches dont have balls to tell them basicly anything what to do with the ball and how to play as team ? But somehow the other countries multimillionaire players specially from europe do listen and follow the instructions of the their coaches and also the so called used be small countries have cathed up with the big guns, right ? i do know that southamerican qualifiers are hardest qualifiers of the whole world ! and now when euro’s were last time in france were portugal beat france on their home soil it was the first time when there were so many countries allowed to qualify to whole tournament it self and now the euro’s are deffinetly spoiled for big time because of money and it never will be the same tournament anymore simply because there is too many countries participating in the tournament itself ! this is one thing i really dont like and another thing is that the money issue with player price’s and wages have long gone over the limit and now it is so hillarious soap opera saga that will continue until everything will collapse simply because they are just playing allready with virtual money that doesnt even exist in reality like there is not simply enough such amount of gold or gems or some other valuable items available in this world left so it is all just pure madness like the coaching issues argentina has been facing for quite long time allready and is facing also right now, hope though that everything will get better at football terms at least for argentina and that they could finally find someone who has the balls to tell all the players and i mean Messi too that what to do with ball and what to do when u dont have the ball ! sorry about frustration it is neither nothing to do with unor your country just only i want them to win and i’m getting as obsessed like Messi now and the rest of your country because all those bloody 3 finals after eachother and everytime i felt argentina was superior to their opponent ! so i’m really hardcore fan forvyour country much morevthan for my own and most of the times when theybplayni have close my eyes and go outside to cool myself and try bring my nerves to so called normal level, like yesterday before he took the penalty i just closed my eyes because i felt i wont go in and offcourse it didnt ! so i throwed my water bottle luckily plastic one against my wall in front of my kids who dont really still understand the game rules etc. but they started to support the black shirts because they did understod that whatbit meant for me personally.
    my old man also did like argentina a lot but offcourse him and my granfather allways supported the germans first because my country got only arms from germans when russians did attacked us during the second world war because of bloody stalin was as crazy as hitler himself was and no one else wanted give us arms because that time they fought the germans together with russians even our next door neigbours swedish bastards who were so called neutral and did not participate in the war itself but solf lots of arms to many countries in the end they gave us 10 thousand soldiers so then we had like 110 thousand soldiers against millions of russians and we’re forced to make alliance with the germans even we did not participate in hitlers holocaust ! so that obviously made my granfather a german fan because he did participate in the war like my grandmom as well but my father skipped the army and so did i because we didnt have to face what my granparents went trough, and my father purely liked westgermany because of their golden era of players from the early 70’s and he also liked obviously cruyff and dutch total football style but i think 1978 he supported argentina for first time and after it was allways hard for him to decide between the germans and argentiina and when he saw me supporting argentina for first time in 1982 then also i was lucky not to be old enough because my grandfather might have turned me to a german supporter, lol. which never did happen and will never happen never mind who’s playing or coaching yor country !

    • unless the AFA has changed in last 4 years, then player selection is basically down to them and the deals they’ve done with foreign media companies where certain players have to play… this is how it used to be am not sure if it’s changed but i doubt it…

    • Ricky
      Problems with players is problems in Argentina. Many of our great players get sold too young and do not get the development they need. Then all we have is potential.
      The problem with coaches is really AFA I believe. Grondona used national team like a whore. They sell games for anything to put money in their pockets. And they never pay the coaches so good coaches do not come.
      For example, somebody like Sampaoli sounds great and he may be good long term but everybody is worried about winning this year. So today there is so much pressure he cannot even think.
      People do not remember all the fights between Bilardo and Maradona when Maradona was a player. But Bilardo forced him to play a 3-5-2 system that was very structured. If any player did anything out of responsibility they were out. Today, these fuckers like DiMaria screw up play after play and nobody says to them, take a seat or good bye.
      Also, these coaches do not have credibility. In my opinion they need a younger coach. Imagine how good we would be if we had kept Sabella. Sabella is only 63 and he would have had 6 years by now for a great project with this team. It is sad but I think only after Messi leaves will we realize he is no longer there to save us so we must get our act together.

  86. Germany lost and looked weak on defense, all-mighty Brazil tied the ultimate Pacifist country …….we are all on the same level as far as the first mishap goes.

  87. Guys, Germany loss is a good thing for us, Mexico just needs to win big against South Korea and they are almost certainly top the group.

    If Germany finish second, not only they will likely meet Brazil, but they will also be on another bracket. So all: Brazil, Germany, France, one of Spain or Portugal will be on one side. Our bracket will consist of: Portugal or Spain, Belgium or England only.

    However, 2 things needed now:
    1. We NEED to top the group by beating Croatia and Nigeria
    2. Brazil NEED to win their group.

    For this reason, for the first time in my life, I won’t be upset if they win big against Costa Rica or Serbia.

    If Brazil finish second? They will move to our bracket and we might meet them in the semis.
    So for me Brazil draw today is not really good news… and I am a number one Brazil hater.

    • Even with draw today, Brazil will top their group. I’m doubtful whether Mexico can beat Sweden or Korea. One win and another draw will be enough for them to top the group.
      My bigger doubt comes from Argentina whether they can beat Croatia and Nigeria. Both are tougher teams than the teams Germany and Brazil will be facing.
      What I learnt from this WC so far- it’s very difficult to win a match in group stage if a team concedes. Argentina have to keep a cleansheet against Croatia, any how.

      • if Brazil failed to beat Costa Rica then can be eliminated luke Argentina 2002 after topping combebol. Nevertheless sarbia is much stronger than Suzerland. For Germany they can earn max 6points and Mexico need a win and draw

    • Var is a fucking technology used
      It has less good impact and more bad.
      It has raised many questions…
      A debate is Var

      It’s not the 3rd umpire decision like in cricket
      Var also taking time from the game..

      I don’t like VAR

      I think we had a penalty by foul on pavon..but VAR was not taken

  89. It seems like there may be instructions to have less yellow cards this world cup. And it seems like a lot more potential fouls aren’t being called. Maybe they want to have a more free flowing game.

    I can see this stopping “diving” but it might hurt the attacking players.

    Also, I’m excited about this lineup. I even own a Di Maria jersey, but I’m glad that he isn’t starting. He did not play well.

  90. Can someone tell me why Pavon and Jesus did not get the penalty?

    and Ronaldo got it, even though it was not?

  91. I rated this Swiss team highly.
    They performed good defense without being ultra defensive. Look how Shaqiri bossed the right side. Possesion, number of passes, is not far like yesterday.
    Defense wise they’re almost as good as Iceland but having a dynamic, exciting attack too, skillful players not like Iceland. Brazil didn’t play better than us. Maybe yes in the 1st half, but Argentina from min 70’s yesterday was like an attacking machine.

  92. For me the best match of Sampaoli’s Argentina WITH MESSI IN THE STARTING LINE UP (don’t tell me the game vs Italy) was without doubt Argentina victory vs Ecuador 3-1. I don’t like 3-4-3, but we played 3-4-3 there.

    It is still a rumor but in the link above, it says that not only he will change some players, but the formation too.

  95. well first matches for all teams apart from russia has been tough lol.. who got a good draw considering the saudis were suffering from fasting…..might not have been 5-0 had the match been played one week later.

  96. Curiouser and curiouser!

    ARgentina- draw
    Germany – loss
    Brazil- draw

    Things are thick!

    Brazil doesn’t look that impressive but Germany looks bad!

    Let’s how it goes for us with Croatia. We might not be that bad.

    • Cabalero-mercado,otamendi,fazio,taglifico-perez,masche,locelso-messi,aguero,pavon.

      I think with this team we might be able to play croatia. Posession is key. We dont need to panic because they are waiting for it. The croats are very special kind of people. The people are not unite in cheering for team because all problems with corupcy, centralization and so on. I am from split (southern part of country) and really dont like them even though their are my. Its intersting but i allways go for argentina. Because of diego, veron, messi and others. But be carefull. In this moment croats are better side. When you look squad probaly only leo, otamendi and aguero will have place in first 11. Wonderfull generation with so needed experience and skill. I am allways oprimistic but cant say that i wont be happy with draw. Sadly but the team didnt represent nothing against iceland.

    • I have a short memory but not that short. Nigeria game? That was when we found out we don’t have 3 good defenders for 3-4-3.

      I am trying to be so positive but I must say that I really scratch my head at the coach. I don’t know what he’s trying to create. Switching things so drastically after a month of training is worrying. I am not asking to make a bunch of crazy changes just asking what his idea is. I have trust but need to see some results. We’ve been bouncing off the bottom for almost two years.

  100. pfft watching swiss players getting yellow cards for pulling and pushing players and icelandic players who did that against us got no yellow cards at all, even though one player can’t remember the name did it 4 times!!!! NO consistency in refereeing!

  105. Neymar-Coutinho case was similar to that of Messi-Dybala. People thought that those two couldn’t play together because they used to occupy the same place and have quite similar playing style. When Tito came, Coutinho was even benched in favour of Neymar. But now see, how Tite is able to fit them together within a short time. He found a new place for Coutinho and trio of Marcelo-Countinho-Neymar on left flank is deadly. This is the trait of genius players; they can always understand others and can tweak their game accordingly.
    I can’t fathom why Messi-Dybala can’t be fit into system together? Why they always have to be mutually exclusive?

      • Yes, in short time. He put Coutinho on right flank. Then he put a new place for him in LM which turn out to be better.
        I haven’t said, Tite is a coach of Brazil for a short time. I told Tite integrated Coutinho in the team within a short time.

      • No one can do the stuff that Mascherano does in midfield. He is a rock in defensive midfield and he never shys away from putting in hard and tough tackles. He is also a leader on the pitch. He has shown enough in the Iceland match that he still has got it in him.

    • So true. But brazil is not good. They all just press good and run. Except neymar. Can someone tell why icardi and paredes are not in our team. For me pavon messi aguero dybala must play for soor

    • wnjoy: Remember, it wasn’t people nor the coach who though Dybala-Messi is impossible to invent. It was Messi who refused to play along side Dybala claiming he would share with him the free space, Messi went to convince Sampaoli that his partnership with Dybala can’t be accommodated.

      Part of me tells me that Messi wants to save Daybala’s spot for his buddies. Same in Barca, Messi is afraid that the arrival of Griezman would be on the expense of his buddy (Suarez) starting spot since Griezman’s condition is to be a starter in Barca if he makes the move.

      You guys should realize that Messi has a broad power in both NT and Club level and he uses his power in player selection more often. This is not trolling, nor illusion, always insiders and retired legends who are closer to the secene provide us with insider information.

      The bottom line is: Messi doesn’t like the idea of having Dybala playing while he’s on pitch. I’m surprised he was brought to WC from first place to be honest. The only reason he’s brought to Russia in case messi gets injured, or gets 2 yellow cards.

      • @WCRussia : Do you even know that Messi asked Barca to sign Dybala if possible instead of Coutinho / Verotti!! Barca even tried. Coutinho was their third choice.

        And you sound conflicting in your method – If Messi uses his power and selects his buddy for his club then Messi is awesome cause his club is one of the very best. He has managerial power than, that’s good news for us.

        Tite is their for Brazil for last 2 years and Coutinho plays as mid in his club too. Sampaoli didn’t have that much time with NT and Dybala can only play one position. Messi, Dybala situation is like Jesus, Farminho, Neymar situation. Though Farmingo scores almost everytime he plays but he is not starter… he is a super sub…

        • friends, we can do one thing that we first dismantle our team. get new young blood like
          angel correa, locelso, kranevitter, parades, pavon, tagleafico, lanzini, bustos, emanuel cecchini, ascaciber, ruli, centurion, fuyth, German conti. built up the new team, take a friendly with top tier teams like Iceland, Brazil, Spain, portugal.

      • Everything you say is based on ZERO FACTS so I’m going to go ahead and reject your dramatic conspiracy theory. bottom line: One big fat lie

      • Where do you people read all of this gossip. Give me a break! Update your news sources. This is pure trash your reading.

        There is literally an interview of Messi saying him an Dybala talked about playing together and they both understand it’s hard to accommodate. So it has t worked yet.

        Why make some crazy story up. Get a grip

    • Mascherano is one of the stand outs. We would be dead without him. Biglia, I agree.
      Mascherano – Banega or Mascherano – lo Celso. No Banega – lo Celso. We’ll be killed.

      But agree Salvio shouldn’t be benched, unless it is proven that Mercado is in better shape than him (coach knows better).

      With Pavon and Meza/Dybala, opponents would lost their track.

  106. All is not lost but we definitely needs to beat Crotia. Then drawing with Nigeria or beating them would take us through. But to do that we need to drop that dead player Biligia and play mascherano in destroyer position. Maschareno is not good enough to create chances. There is a reason he was converted to CB in Barcelona

  109. Hi, being true fan of Argentine Football, I love to see Messi on right wing handing over his captancy to Mascherano. Dybala to be at attacking center mid field along side PAVON, celso

    • Mascherano is not useful in this days of attacking football he must be in bench giving pitch time to le celso banega . And di Maria is must dropped to pavon

    • Maschareno do not have creative football iq. That is why he plays in CB at barcelona instead of his favor position DM. All of his passes are lame and quite predictable by defenders. That is why we need him to play destroyer and bench donkey biliga. Biligia is responsible for our all loses in finals. This guy is in bench in AC Milan.

  110. what a good goalkeeper allison.
    the left back and right back players collecting the balls from their right wing left wing. what a co ordination.

    all the Brazil players are cheating the referee to get the ball. this what we needed while opponent holding the ball.

    Brazil team definitely they lose when they play vs France or Belgium or Spain or portugal.

  111. we missed out lanzini.

    neymar is acting like shit. he is cheating the team what he did in last world cup.

  112. what a fantastic goal by coutinho. we lost our player lanzini he is similar to coutinho. sampaoli did not find any of the person. what a team play by Brazil. nobody is losing the ball from brazil. di maria is worthless, there is no sense at all in Argentina players. they are playing like a champion. every one is contributing. ball is moving forward from midfield. their players are not depending on neymar.
    tite is genius. sampaoli please learn from tite how to built up the with team individual, Team spirit. you are a shiij t coach. you all people wasted messi career. even messi also wasted his career with Argentina. sampaoli chosen shit players like mascherano, rojo, dimaria, billiards, higuain, banega.

  116. Its a good thing that germany lost and now its brazils turn.hope it will be a draw.
    Not because to see our major opponents fail and laugh but it will certainly transform the media and peoples attentions and opinions.all teams are in a spot of bother and more importantly all so called minnows are improved and performing well.so its not only us and not the time to get upset but bounce back…!
    Meanwhile i am not sure about this news of benching dimaria.i think he will start.biglia and salvio will be the culprits.
    Also i am not thinking there will be five or six changes.
    If we are playing with a masche lo celso midfield masche has to sit back deep and lo celso has to dictate the tempo.i dont think sampaoli will have the guts to do that.somewhere along the training he will change his mind and enzo would come in to the mix of things.
    I am expecting a masche enzo lo celso mid to start against croatia with dimaria(better to use pavon)messi aguero upfront…..

  118. San isidro, thnx 4 your reply ! i totally understand what u mean ! In my country it is the same with icehockey, some players are just untouchable’s even though there are plenty of good icehockey coaches around but in this case i wish that they could transform themself’s to football coaches, but offcourse that is impossible because unfortunatly here they don’t know jack shit of football, lol ! They only follow premierleague and championship from england and bundesliga from germany and offcourse la liga too and maybe little bit of ligue 1 from france and serie a from italy which i personally hope will come close back to the glorydays when it was far superior league in all of the league’s from europe before the so called money era took over !
    Ricky
    We have so many football players in our country that we can field 3 teams. But instead the coaches have no courage. They REFUSE to hold any player accountable. Even Messi, they have on such a high pedestal that if he has a bad game nobody criticize him fairly. It is not his responsibility to win any games for us. He is only one player. But nobody says shit when he misses an easy penalty and shits the bed. That is fair criticism. We have lost our way. I hope we can open our eyes and learn from the passion and courage of the Mexicans today. Our guys, no fucking heart. But what do you expect when there is no accountability. Every time they fuck up no accountability, even for guys like Higuain who have lost this country 3 finals

  119. Happy with the inclusion of Pavon as starter. The three of them will make a great trio.

    Sampaoli should try Dybala at right when things are not working for Meza. He switching middle-right-middle with Messi will bring catastroph to Croatia.

    Lo Celso is also a good option rather than Biglia, but I’m not sure if compared with Banega. He played great last night when coming in, especially in helping the attack. It’s Banega or lo Celso, to me it’s Banega after watching last night form, but coach know better on lo Celso condition.

    And not sure about Mercado for Salvio, Mercado in Sevilla surely not half bad. But looking at last night number from ws, 4 tackles, 2 interception and 3 clearance from Salvio was not a bad number at all.

  120. U can change the team and bring in 10 more new players but nothing is gonna change if Messi is going to ignore all of them and starts looking to pass only to Aguero n Ho Maria. He really thinks his team can leave it late and get lucky like the last WC? Wake up hero, we need u. Even if we get kicked out of the first round show some fight and pride. Watch Peru, Mexico and even Australia. Di Maria u hore. Rojo, Biglia n Caballero are shit eating shameless things that don’t deserve to be playing in a WC. They are ruining the quality of a tournament of this calibre. Why Messi completely refuse to play passes with Mesa and Salvio? Does he think they are not worth his time? Inexplicable. Why always Aguero and Ho Maria and midfield magician Mascherano. Go play in Ibiza with these guys. You guys are not a little club and not bigger than the game. We diehard fans deserve some respect.

  122. san isdiro you want to say that messi is the main reason for argentina’S failore???I have just one question to you that why argentina not winning a single major trophy since 1993???is all faults going for messi?messi was offered many time to play as a spanish but he refused it everytime.if he played for spain he had had 1 wc and 2 euro.but messi said he wanted a trophy with argentina instead all he achieved with barca.if you guys have better idea than sampaoli you should apply for argentina’s manager.becoming manager if you win wc i will accept what you said .

    • Mohammad
      You make my point. I am saying this is not Messi’s fault. I am saying this is the teams fault.
      But read your post. Nobody can say he ever make a mistake. If you do it is like insulting God to some people.
      The team is not good. The team has been bad for a long time. They fail in biggest moments. But let me ask you a question. Did the team miss an easy penalty shot or Messi?
      You understand what I am saying? Yes, Messi does many wonderful things. But he is a human being and makes mistakes. Yesterday he made a mistake.

        • Mohammad
          I did. The team is bad. My advice is if you love Messi so much just watch Barcelona man.
          You know how many Messi led teams have one trophies for Argentina at the senior level? The same number I have won and you have won. Zero.

  123. Guys,
    What do you think of Geronimo Rulli of Real Sociedad?

    I did watch him play a few times in La Liga and I loved him. Why wasn’t he called up?

  126. 1. Great. Can we keep things quiet and not announce out line-up at all?
    2. I’m happy to be proven wrong. If the 3 are indeed playing, then great news!

  127. Actually, looking at match statistic at whoscored, salvio made much more decent defending job last night than Tagliafico.

    4 tackles, 2 interception and 3 clearance.

    While Tagliafico didn’t had any (yes, literally 0-0-0).
    And in attack he did equal with Tagliafico.
    Remember there was one good run when he brought the ball all the way to near Iceland’s goal.

    I’ve got to rewatch the game. Cause what I remembered, Tagliafico wasn’t half bad, when on the ball that is.

    But remembering the goal, it did came from the left flank of Argentina. So…
    I think Salvio shouldn’t be replaced, Tagliafico needed evaluation from coach.
    Funny, cause his style remind me of Heinze, when bringing the ball forward. But with no tackle, clearance, interception whatsoever…. I need to rewatch the game!

    Mexico left back for instance, given the man of the match, with… Insanely high 9 interception!

    • Salvio wasn’t good while defending; That is clearly visible;
      Also Tagliafico & Rojo weren’t that gr8 on the left side too;

      • Well you won’t expect that whoscored were making the numbers.

        They maybe not accurate, but probably not making it (what do they gain ?).

        Did they forgot to write down every defensive action Tagli did? Lol.

        • It’s not just about number of tackles. You don’t even needed to make many tackles against a team like Iceland. He was terribly out of position.

          • Out of position? 2 interception and 3 clearance.

            Do you mean he make those at Iceland part of the field?

            That’s why I said I have to rewatch it and focus on him and Tagli.

            If we look at Germany result today (didn’t see the match tbh), kinda getting why they lost. Looking at the number of Mexico left back, 9 interception. He probably outskilled Germany winger all the night, cutting every passes directed to or from the Germany winger (who was it? Muller? Draxler?)

            And we know Germany is good at wing.

  128. OMG this WC is already Crazy, within 4 days of starting.
    Spain (Proved that they r Not unbeatable)
    Portugal (Hate it but watch out for them as luck seems to be in their favor nowadays, Not by any means a great team)
    France (scrambled against a weak Australia not looking like a WC winning team)
    Argentina (Well….)
    Germany(Beaten)
    Brazil (I think they will be fine)
    England & Belgium (Both will be fine i guess)

    And Sampa thinks Caballero is good with his feat and can start an attack, What the F***ing Hell, forget about playing with Legs at least do your job with Hands. Look at The Mexico GK the confidence with which he is passing the ball. We already have enough headache with the Defenders and Full backs too. What in the world have we done now that the GK also looks shitty(By the way I like Caballero but he was gud 4 years ago not now)Armani i cant say he would solve the problem. Haven’t seen him that much, whatever seen he has gud reflex, looks like a crazy GK. Well what to say..

  129. Batigol9, well said ! :that Germany MEXICO game was unbelievably quick in transition from defence to attack , our players should watch this game and see how football is played in 2018

    • thank you Ricky Villa, even Sampaoli in his press conference acknowledged that the transition was too slow, I felt like I was watching a game from the 70s

  131. San Isidro, what a great comment again ! i quess that we don’t have any good coaches at the moment for us they are all taken to somewhere else ! Too bad, but sadly true, right ? : Until we hire a coach that understands Argentina is bigger than Messi, we will continue to struggle.
    These limp dicks come in as coach and they bow to Messi instead of challenging him and coaching the team. I like Messi, but I love Argentina. What is wrong with these fucking coaches? Did they leave their testicles at home?
    And get rid of that fucking stiff Caballero. He has sucked for so long I can’t even remember the last time he was good that it mattered.
    Grow a pair of balls Sampaoli. Start Dybala and Armani instead of Meza and caballero. At least then if you lose you can say you went down with your best players. And you can use biglia dimaria Higuain and banega to give Messi a foot rub because they sure as shit can’t contribute anything on the pitch

    • Ricky
      We have so many football players in our country that we can field 3 teams. But instead the coaches have no courage. They REFUSE to hold any player accountable. Even Messi, they have on such a high pedestal that if he has a bad game nobody criticize him fairly. It is not his responsibility to win any games for us. He is only one player. But nobody says shit when he misses an easy penalty and shits the bed. That is fair criticism. We have lost our way. I hope we can open our eyes and learn from the passion and courage of the Mexicans today. Our guys, no fucking heart. But what do you expect when there is no accountability. Every time they fuck up no accountability, even for guys like Higuain who have lost this country 3 finals

        • @Gonzalo. Do u know this young player Amione from Belgrano. Juventus are interested in taking him to Italy.
          And Banfield’s Julian Carranzo, who could move to Ajax.

          • Carranza I saw 1 or t times in Primera. I didn’t heard still about Amione. He must be still player of youth teams the club.

      • Honestly HATE your comment on Messy, San. Can you mention a shot taken by other player rather than Mes and Agu? All fucker was watcher, you fucker just wait for penalty. Why need to wait for Penalty?

        • Why? This is not insult of Messi. He is one player. Other players need to contribute more. This is coaching fault that they do not hold-everyone accountable. Messi plays well most of time but this is not enough. If it was, we would win more.

        • I have no problem with Messi being weak/average penalty kicker but why he is still taking the penalties?

          And his incessant driblings instead of quick pass…

          • other players need to contribute more. This is coaching fault that they do not hold-everyone accountable. Yes, this is the truth behind the game. Proud for being realistic, and see the brazil game; they are not depended at lll on Neymer.

    • ricky villa: the man to hire is poch at our Tottenham (not that i want him to leave us at all, now or ever) but as hes on a small sum of near 3 million g.b.p per year and this is simple not going to happen with out bankrupt afa.
      i would have been happy with mr take no shit simeone but the rumors are he and the afa do not at all get along as he will not “toe the party line” and nor should he have to (im not sure about the currant afa as they are newish to the job).
      sim would have been great to kick some ass and seriously motivate so many of our players who still believe they are able to play with no urgency and amble around the pitch as we saw from some during large parts of w.c game 1.

  132. Germany is far in a difficult situation than argentina. WHY?

    Sweden is stronger than mexico.
    In the qualification sweden won both of the games against Netherlands. And also they played very well against france in ther group (qualification for the world cup)

    They have reached the second place in the group and played in the play offs against italy. Sweden is the reason why italy had not made it for the world cup.

    Sweden is also stronger than croatia.

    What i want to say is, a draw is not bad against a strong team like island..

    • blue i beg to differ. sweeden is by no means a good team overall maybe defensively they are decent not good. they beat an aging and poor dutch side i remeber even czech republic beat the dutch away. italy were absolutely rubbish through qualyfying and in their play-off they were poor. the squad selection was weak and so was the coach. sweeden is not better than crooatia maybe defensively. i think germany goes through. in 2010 they lost to serbia, in 2014 drew with ghana euro 2016 struggled vs poland but they have too much for sweeden and korea for sure

      • I think you’re talking about another sweden XD

        Like oliver kahn said after the german vs mexico game on the free tv.

        “Sweden is stronger than island in the defensive and on the same level than croatia as a team”

        I am from germany.

        • if khan said it its a respectable opinion but i still think the germans are too good for them. i think its always good to face adversity early and react and thats why i think germany will recover and go through at least now they know where their problems are

    • Blue: Add to that Sweden consider Russia their 2nd home. Swedish travel there on weekly basis. Similar culture and most people just cross the river in a boat to get to Russia. I lived in Sweden for 2 years and I used to see Russian people in Sweden during the weekend. So just consider they are playing home.

  133. Argentina fans are too much concentrated on biggest opponents flaws instead our own. If not Germany you will find always another strong competitor instead to be face by Argentina.
    In 1982 Germany lost to Algieria in groups and them make final. Germany losing first game in groups were always in final stages.

  134. MarioTyson 1984, i like your login name ! And same goes for your thoughts !
    I am in my 40 years. I watch Argentina all my life. I dont understand how icardi and paredes are not in this team. Biglia should not be in this team. The best possible SQUAD is armani mercado otamendi fazio ansaldi lo celsio macherano messi dybala aguero pavon

  135. If u have seen my comment before the world cup started, i mentioned Germany is in chaos and i expected them to be out before quarter final, seems like it is happening.

    I think they will have a hard time playing against Sweden, the team which knocked out Italy and Holland.

  136. Germany-Mexico game is described as the best group stage match so far for being a breathtaking game in every ball touch. I totally agree, that the type of performance that makes me cancel some schedule and sit by the tv to watch the WC.

  137. Until we hire a coach that understands Argentina is bigger than Messi, we will continue to struggle.
    These limp dicks come in as coach and they bow to Messi instead of challenging him and coaching the team. I like Messi, but I love Argentina. What is wrong with these fucking coaches? Did they leave their testicles at home?
    And get rid of that fucking stiff Caballero. He has sucked for so long I can’t even remember the last time he was good that it mattered.
    Grow a pair of balls Sampaoli. Start Dybala and Armani instead of Meza and caballero. At least then if you lose you can say you went down with your best players. And you can use biglia dimaria Higuain and banega to give Messi a foot rub because they sure as shit can’t contribute anything on the pitch

    • San Isidro: I agree with you, it’s time to stop the nonsense lazy coaching of lets build a team around Messi and let messi do the magic, and no need to train other players on collective football. Maradona smoking his cigar in training camp (south Africa) and just watches Messi playing with the ball which reminds him of his golden age, other coaches have been doing the same.

      Technical training staff are not doing their job: Train the attackers to run with the ball while attached to sand bags, stop to circle players around the ball and make short passes randomly, that is not training.

  138. i have to give my credit to mexicans, well done ! i hope we could play like them too, but i still got my doubts about our coach and his player selections, sorry to say this and offcourse i will allways support argentina until the day i die, but it really hurts to see year after year the amount of talent we just wasted for so so long time allready ! when will this madness end ? i hoped that this would be our year finally, but if sambal olek dont get his shit together then AFA need to fire him and get somebody who can develop our youngsters who could and should have been in russia allready now !

    • Does it look likely that this German team will beat Brazil?

      lol its more likely that Brazil will beat Germany like 7-0 or something. With the form of Hummels and Boateng, and Gabriel Jesus Coutinho and Neymar, this Germany will just perish on current form.

  140. mario gomez is worster than higuen and he is german team.could you believe it???missed free header.

  141. I don’t know why everyone talking for Armani? Was he played ever a pressure match? How he able to do good with us? even cabarello don’t have much international experience but at least he has big game experience, Iceland goal is defensive mistake rather than GK i wonder what happened if he did like De Gea, chill GK isn’t problem for Argentina, Defense and MF has

      • agreed and if any one is not familiar on how cab is that “rabbit in headlights” watch the spain game were he barely moved (only to pick the ball from the net 6 times) and also watch some of the epl games in the 2nd half of the season just finished as he was just as static during them, hes 36 and his time was 4 years ago, sadly it did not happen for him then as it should not now.

    • i agree but to play the way mexico and peru did and even portugal and spain you need all ten outfield players to commit run and have passion. argentina cannot do that with messi on and thats always the problem but the second i feel he puts in the shift and runs and commits just abit more the whole team will follow and theyll stop being scared and bridge that mental gap. all he has to do is just commit more.

  143. POINT here is this, ARGENTINA would gain confidence and lift their heads and be well prepared for their next matches and like I said before, hopefully Brazil is next

  145. I am in my 40 years. I watch Argentina all my life. I dont understand how icardi and paredes are not in this team. Biglia should not be in this team. The best possible SQUAD is armani mercado otamendi fazio ansaldi lo celsio macherano messi dybala aguero pavon

  146. Germany’s loss is no consolation but makes us feel a draw is not bad afterall… Germany played with their best 11 as opposed our less than ideal 11. Perhaps their flaws are there to be exploited in case we meet them.

    We will still qualify if we don’t drop more than 2 points.

    The proposed starting 11 gives me some confidence.

  149. Now we need to Win both games and top the group;
    Mexico might top that group now; Spain & Germany can be out of our way;
    We need to win the remaining two games first;

    Else Ronaldo & POR might go all the way

  150. that Germany MEXICO game was unbelievably quick in transition from defence to attack , our players should watch this game and see how football is played in 2018

  151. They don’t need Sane…! Who will keep Sane out of their national team..? It was the biggest omission..!
    Best feeling if they go out from group stage…woh..!

  156. that same mexican keeper was bloody good allready in brazil 4 years ago and the same goes for the whole team which was eventually beaten by dutchies if i remember right ?

  157. Pavon and Lo Celso starting and Biglia and Di Maria out is indeed good news! It has lifted the gloom in me after yesterday’s game a fair bit.

    Mascherano was a rock yesterday and was playing like a fearless teenager going in hard and tough and winning tackles for us. I think he is a calming influence in defensive midfield.

    One thing we need to improve desperately is the pace of play; we were really stroking the ball aorund at snail speed against Iceland! I hope that is not the coach’s instruction, but that the players are simply looking at the bus of Iceland and chose to play it safe and not confident to find a forward pass. They have also not played together much in a real match situation; so chemistry may be lacking. Or could it be because Sampaoli asked them not to lose the ball and patiently find gaps in the Icelandic defence? Whatever it is, the extremely slow passing of the ball won’t not work against any team in the WC! I hope Sampaoli addresses this urgently.

    Let’s get behind the team in this difficult time! Vamos Argentina!

  158. So what is the remedy for this kind of game? I mean against Bus parking, Jumbo jet parking? Not fair… playing a negative game and then a counter-attack and boom!! It should be like in boxing if you are not active some points will be reduced!!

  159. cox4 , what is your comedy about our coach at the moment ? and what if pekerman’s colombia will go to next round and we wont ? is it still comedy then 4 u ? there is no comedy at the moment at all because we’re in deep shit at the moment ! wake up and start using your brains and wish that we will win our next game otherwise there will be plenty of comedy after that with our suppose to be saviour coach !

    • for the moment i wait to see the end to know if i will put Sampaoli to the same list of idiots i have put Pekerman. and even if Pekerman arrive in final with Colombia i will continue saying the same thing.

      because he is medium level coach. i can remind you many names of coaches that had 1 success tournament and after they go to nowhere after that tournament ends.
      Sampaoli too with Chile had success but…..

      when they go to work in one HUGE teams bench like ARGENTINA s they showing how SMALL coaches they really are.

      so i am waiting the resault of this road for our team to see….

      and as i said Pekerman is a joke.

      in the only thing i agree with you is that we are in deep shit right now and really this is not comedy.
      this is tragedy which make me lose my sleep.
      i pray till Thursday only.

  162. Mexico and Peru both play better than us and it’s an issue. When I look at the lineup, yes it may fix some issues:

    – Salvio’s defense was awful despite his high work-rate, Mercado is more reliable
    – Any player can do better than Biglia. Even Kun defend better than him. Lo Celso cannot do worse.
    – It’s quite logic to replace Di Maria by Pavon. In 20 minutes he did much more than Di Maria during 1h. Much more unpredictable.

    I don’t know if that can totally fix all our issues. But at least it’s better than no change. The most important thing is to have mobile players around Messi.

    • Bud higuain was ok yesterday. I think the subtitions came way too late. Dybala is a young guy why can’t you break his usual way of play and force him to play on the right wing? I understand the fact that sampaoli didn’t have enough time to bring in his football philosophy into the current squad but still I’m not unhappy with the game yesterday in a good game messi goes through the opponent’s defense like a “jedi knight” ;D but yesterday he had a bad day. I won’t give up the hope and won’t stop supporting our team. If you start another pol I will again choose the champion ship option for Argentina because I believe in our dream until the last second.
      I’m not a dreamer and I don’t blame anyone who wants to start flaming because of my opinion. But at the end we all sit in the same boat and if we go into a stormy water I prefer to believe in our survival than to fall in to panic and start to cry and curse who ever is responsible for our misery.

      Anyway guys I love you all and I love our team.

  166. The they keep on minimizing the Mexican their just don’t want to admit Mexico are a better side. dismised them a clear penalty, why fifa doesn’t reviews this play.

  167. if germans lose this one to mexicans then they are allready at very serious situation because sweden and even south korea are not any walkaways ! Specially sweden will be very difficult opponent for germans and i think the koreans have got their speed as well and there is also good goal scorers among their team !

  168. that some fans bring up mentioning the idiot Pekerman is something that really arrive to the limits of comedy !!!

    now what? i expect now somebody to say us about how unfair we behave to Bielsa.
    how good he was but….bla bla bla….
    i wait the next episode of this comedy !!!

  169. IMO the best Argentine lineup is;

    While Defending 4-4-2;
    Mer-Faz-Ota-Ans
    Pav-Mas-LoC-Enz
    Mes-Agu

    While attacking 2332;
    —–Faz-Ota
    –Mer-Mas-Enz
    Pav—LoC——Ans
    —-Mes-Agu

  170. Lozano scored a screamer not so long ago against netherlands or was it spain, cant remember which european country they played against but what a beautybthat goal was , this one today i missedthe beginning but for sure i will look for replay if possible or highlights in the end !

  171. Experience?! Is not the thing that should have been help us to dismantle Iceland defensive wall? Experience of Di Maria, Biglia, Mascherano, Messi, Aguero, ROjo, Otamendi – how that help us yesterday?
    So stop to talk about experience.

  174. A 22 yr old has scored against Germany.If he had been an Argentine, he would have been cooling his heels at home. I have not understood the obsession of Argentine coache’s with experience. A mix of old and young is a must, but persisting with guys who are already down the hill is beyond me.

    • In our midfield Mascherano is enough of experience. Add to him youth energy of Pavon, Lo Celso, MEza and will be ok.

  175. Now that’s a lineup! Honestly the only thing I would change is switching the flanks to Meza plays as LW instead and Pavon as RW. That way Meza has freedom to cut inside and dribble rather than just rely on his speed as he’s doing on RW. Meanwhile, since Pavon is arguably the fastest player we got, he could play on RW.
    And if you need a goal, just take out Pavon and replace him with Dybala on RW so he could also have freedom to dribble and your set! Also, good for Mercado too! He’s the best RB we got! Just get rojo and Caballero out and all is good! Vamos Argentina!

  177. Wouldn’t be nice if the Brazilians tied or at the very least winning after having a tough time so the media can get off our asses about ARG’s game and misses.

    • IF Mexico win the group, it’ll be Germany against Brazil in the Round of 16! 😱 Let the giants eliminate eachother one by one, and when those who remain are worn down, Argentina will finish them off! Vamos Argentina!!!

  178. SPOT ON KITTY ! : Love the energy levels of Mexican Players; Mexico leading at Half time against Germany 0 – 1
    When it comes to NT, Germans always lift their energy to;

    Our energy levels were poor yesterday apart from few; I don’t know why we were under tremendous pressure against the world cup starters right from the starting minute; The movement of the ball was very slow right from the starting minute; It allowed the opponents to settle down their nerves who were playing their 1st World Cup;

  179. please just look at mexican’s for example ! how many oldies they brought exept rafa marquez who’s benched at the moment and they are fully going against germans ! who beat us by a lucky goal from their youngster at very end of the whole match just because we wasted our own chances no need mention any names ! everyone knows why germans are defending champions which offcourse should be us but if u dont take your chances, i mean clear chances one against keeper for several times and you dont bring any game changers with u or do not let them even try then this is what will happen on the end of the day. so please sampal olek get your shit together and for argentina’s sake do and show us what are u really made of ?

    • Thanks for your comments on my previous posts. Yes, agreed. The whole problem is around Messi everything is static. There is no movement. For example whenever Salvio received the ball, he was in stopped position with several Iceland players around him.

  180. Love the energy levels of Mexican Players; Mexico leading at Half time against Germany 0 – 1
    When it comes to NT, Germans always lift their energy to;

    Our energy levels were poor yesterday apart from few; I don’t know why we were under tremendous pressure against the world cup starters right from the starting minute; The movement of the ball was very slow right from the starting minute; It allowed the opponents to settle down their nerves who were playing their 1st World Cup;

  182. Why did we use two 5 with a debutant is mind blogging. Mercado,celso and Pavon should and must start. Di-Maria didn’t do anything to be honest. Sorry to say he just lost his way,old Di-maria was full of energy and enthusiasm and more direct and could drag fouls but he just not clicking i feel. He should have been more direct and threat on the flank and take on players. So should Meza too. This could have unblocked Iceland stubborn defence but instead Di-Maria played safe passes. Meza tried a little i think. This is where Pavon was solid. We gotta improve our quick passing,1/2 and play more direct on both flank. We change side so slow by the time we change other team coach get into the field and reshape his defence again. Alot to improve. Hope it made us stronger as Messi said but Sampaoli should rewrite his script.

  183. The Germans look slow and old on defense, a better team would have scored at least another goal….wouldn’t be something if they LOST :O), even though I think the Krauts will come back and put 3 on them.

    • mexico could have had at least 3 i agree. they need to take these chances cause i also agree the germans if still in the game can punish them second half

  184. ok, pekerman made misstake by taking of riquelme and changing hiim to cambiasso, then so what ? everybody make’s error or misstake somerime’s ! there is nobody who doesnt do it ! even pep did it several ocasions and many other good coaches too but that is nothing to do with the situation right now ! because allready sampa’s 23 men squad sucked big time with including names like biglia, rojo, di maria etc… there could have at least been 3- maybe even 6 better players with more hunger to win an to start building something stable like pekerman used to do with our youngsters before so please i really don’t want to hear sny comparision between pekerman or our dumbass sambal olek !
    because pekerman did what he did with us and give credit to him, please ! sambal olek hasnt made anything yet for us to be happy about, ok ! and btw pekerman is still coaching colombia and they are doing pretty ok under him only problem is maybe lack of goals from their strikers, but wait and see and let them at least play their first game before ! i’m hundred % certain that pekerman is still better coach than sambal olek ! even he did good with chile and sevilla but not with us, ok? and his selection looked really shit allready from 23 man squad and starting eleven against iceland with ball watching biglia an rojo + shaky hand willy and completly useless diva ! that is all most half of the starting eleven if u want add few names more to my list, please u are most welcome ! but sambal olek is our coach now and if he is not selecting the players then there is no sense in anything to named as coach at all ! then we just change his name to puppetof unknown master or to whatever we want ! he barely even shaked the hand of icelandic coach who might actually be dentist, this very possible scenario because population of iceland is not that many people at all ! but that game was wasted mostly because of theese 4 players i mentioned before and really stupid coaching ! pavon should been brought in after 22 seconds, seriously ! biglia should not be in russia with rojo at all and same goes with diva !

    • why you talking about pekarmen???he ruined argentina’S best chance.in that match argentina are ahed till 83 minutes.even he not allow messi(this is worst decision in 2006 wc ) to show the world what he can do.if pekarmen used messi properly he had given the best young player award.

  186. i never understand this dying need for coaches like sampa and the rest before him to try and force the team to play like barca so messi can shine. thats not how argentina play and they dont have the players. apart from messi all these players grew from the argentine leagues and then europe. why not install the traditional way of play and if its so obvious the team cant be built for messi. simply build a team and put messi in it as a forward. i think part of the reason the players play that way by giving messi and watching is because thats the coaches instructions. its time for the team to play as a team and stop playing for messi.

    • Chiellini said pep ruined italian football with the ball playing centerback idea. Now we can see pep effect on argentina. He helped messi become the player he is but the longer hair version under rijkaard is more suitable to the national team.

      • i think chiellini was silly by saying that. there is no rule telling coaches to play like pep . you dont have to do that to be successful its just a stupid comment from chiellini. diego simeone has been sucessful has very few similarities to pep style, zidane doesnt play like pep, klopp doesnt, and that goes for argentina its not a must to play like pep, we dont have the players.

  187. Pavon must be better than Di Maria. Lo Celso must be better than Biglia – just try to understand this, Mr. Sampaoli, and let the worn out oldies go far from the team. Let the youngsters bring their passion into field. Where’s your flexible mind that was supposed to make you better than Bielsa. Come on!

  188. Sampaoli got the starting eleven back to front for both games.
    If we needed more impotence against Iceland then lo Celso would’ve been perfect over Biglia. I am sure the result might have been different too. With that in mind the Croatia game you could forgive him to have the double pivot of Mascherano and Biglia.
    Biglia was the main source for conceding the equalizer. The profanity that spewed out of my mouth for him hasn’t helped my anxiety.

    • You can blame caballero for a weak hand
      Rojo etc

      All players give the ball away at some point in a game but not always a goal

      We had a lot of chances after the biglia pass to recover

  190. In my opinion we should go for a backline like this.
    Rojo is dangerous in CB, Tagliafico also.
    In my opinion Rojo will be a better bet than Tagliafico.

    Mercado,Otamendi,Fazio,Rojo

    • Rojo over Tagliafico? Rojo’s natural position is CB, so if he can’t even pull that off do you honestly think he can pull off being a full back? Rojo’s only role should be as a ball boy or a water boy, but apparently that fool sampaoli will not drop him unless the horns of judgement day are sounded.

    • Perfect.
      Team should be – Cabellaro, Mercado, Otamendi, Fazio,Rojo, Mascherano, Lo Celso, Pavon, Messi, Meza, Aguero.
      Subs: Dybala must come in by 70th min if Argentina is losing by1 goal. I think even draw against Croatia can be accepted if things goes wrong on the pitch.

  191. We must realize If Sampaoli will drop Di Maria it will be almost historical giving how untouchable he is.

  192. More than his team selection what worries me is Sampoli’s gane time decisions.
    For example any wise manager would have replaced Biglia in half time, he wasted 8 more minutes for that. It was 100% certain, Biglia had nothing to do in that game.

    Higuain was a suitable option. He should have bring him much before 80th Minute. He fights well for space with strong players. He did it well in the last 10 minutes.. he should have get more minutes, then it would have been easier fir aguero to shoot or even for himself..
    There’s no justification in playing meza for 80 minutes.
    No words about Pavon. I had written before the game as well, Pavon type fast attack from left side without crosses was a solution. It almost worked.
    Pavon should have come at half time.

    • “There’s no justification in playing meza for 80 minutes”.

      Who earned the penalty? Meza or Pavon? Here’s justification. Meza is loking for run always but there’s no player to deliver the pass.

      Was not you one of the people who wanted to see Meza in Starting eleven before? If so, don’t you think new player deserves more credit than old fart Di Maria who fucked up 80% of his NT games and was worst in our team along with Biglia? I mean: Di Maira is the player who should be droped in Pavon favour and not Meza.

  193. Sula V , i also think that croatia will play counter against us because that is our weakest point ! and the scenario u are talking about is the reality we are facing tight now this is our most crucial game of the whole tournament ! win it and go get another win against nigerians and then we can start to be again little bit positive, maybe ? that all is in sampa’s hands now, nothing more to add if this shitty fucked up players like rojo, shaky willy and diva i dont want to even mention biglia’s name, really mad to even to hear hus name, but just to be sure with everyone, please stop talking about that guy and just forget ignore him completly, i wished that our small fella from atalanta would have injured him more badly, but offcourse he had to go ball watching to russia like rojo as well ! : We need a miracle to win against Croatia in a high pressure do or die game with our vulnerable defense, shaky goalkeeping, confused coach and DIMARIA. Positive thinkers and posters are damn sure Croatian team won’t park the bus so they are relaxed we will outscore them. The whole world knows we have hard time breaking park bus defense but positive posters will say no no no … No no nopeeeee Croatia played attacking football against Nigeria. No no no… They will not do that unfair thing to us.. No no no noooooo….The truth is Croatia will sit back and attack and god forbid if they happen score first then we are done done DONE!!!! Our weak and zero chemistry defense won’t be able to handle Croatian counters with our Midfield in opposition’s half!! That loss means we crash out from the world cup without even playing 3rd game as Iceland most likely will beat overconfident Nigerians. But again our positive thinkers will then bring 2022 world cup preparation while playing against Nigeria in our last game . We can give our youngesters some world cup exposure and mentally prepare them for next world cup.

    Croatians are 10 times more clinical and their counters will be lethal!!!!! Did you not see Rojo’s back pass to Caballero?? Thats says everything about our team chemistry and level of understanding our defense has with each other. Whenever Iceland attacked us on counters instead of marking the players in the box our defenders gather around the goalkeeper!! Is that how professional defenders play??? The coach is clueless about breaking the park bus defense. But again mr B postives are like no body can do anything against a team that play with 10 defenders you know!!!!! You knowwwww!!!! We got atleast 1 point against Iceland. We have 2 more games left you know!!! Even if we somehow manage to draw next game we are doomed!! Didn’t Sampoli already know Iceland were going to play with 10 defenders? He was waiting for Dimaria to do some magic till 80th minute. He had 5 days continuos training with yesterday’s team and he couldn’t see playing Biglia was like playing with one less player. Biglia was playing for Iceland team against us yesterday.Some of you guys either are casual fans or you watch football every 4 years because apparently you have no clue how extremely difficult it is going to be against Croatia next game. Track record of our players shows they are not good in handling high pressure situations like this one. Only hope is that penalty miss yesterday will bring out the monster inside Messi!!!! Baldy got us in this situation.If we crash out Baldy will solely be responsible!!!!

    • i don’t why he still prefers cabellero ,there’s no reason i think sampa will use him to create goals😂😂😂😂as he says cabellero good with feet.at best he can be substitute for penalty shootout.

  195. I don’t think Croatia are that strong, I have watched Rakitic all season with Barca he was very shitty this season, of course Modric is another story but we have Messi also . I think it will be how efficient our attack is vs how much our defense can hold and not make stupid mistakes as we can expect to concede one goal at least. I don’t expect Croatia to be ultra defensive like Iceland as they dont have the capabilities to last that long, Most likely it will be a draw but I hope i’m mistaken. For us its a mental game if we play to 70%of our potential we can beat anyone in this cup , Aguero’s goal yesterday was phenomenal. Maybe it was a good exercise that we played in such extremely tight spaces, that may help us in next two games .

  196. mamoun el pipita , exatly why sampa doesnt use ansaldi ? and whatbis rojo doing in russia, looking for russian girls or boys i dont know and i dont care but he should never have entered the airplane which flew to russia ! : If this is true then it’s good news but then it also means that Rojo is still there, which is remarkable!! It must be heaven to play for this argentine side because you can crap the bed in every game and still get selected!
    Mercado is a solid choice but i really must wonder why Ansaldi isn’t being selected, especially since he’s by far Argentina’s best attacking fullback, which sadly isn’t saying much and his last starting match was against Croatia where he scored a screamer if im not mistaken.

  197. I summarize this article to share the 5 key to win this WC.
    #1 Keep Messi away from the midfield
    Sampaoli will need to talk to his captain and get him to stay as close to the opposition’s 18-yard box as much as he can. This would ensure that the opposing defenses would be constantly pinned back, as they would be scared to commit too much for fear of leaving the La Pulga unmarked.
    #2 Make bold decisions
    Pavon, Banega, Paulo Dybala and even Giovani Lo Celso are dynamic players who have the skill-set to make things happen for the team, they should be trusted with starting berths.
    #3 Keep Willy Caballero away from the first eleven
    Nahuel Guzman (Tigres) and Franco Armani (River Plate) are the other goalies in the squad. None of them are spring chickens (both are aged 32) but given that they have played more games for their club sides than Caballero, Sampaoli may have to make the decision and get one of them in if the team are to progress.
    #4 Drop all unfit players
    The very poor di Maria whose only contributions were constant complaints has been a bench warmer at PSG. Biglia and Marcus Rojo spent much of last season outside their clubs’ first teams as well. Players like Pavon, Federico Fazio, and Gabriel Mercado among others should be starting ahead of the unfit ones.
    #5 Change the midfield setup
    Against a Croatian side with a midfield far superior to theirs, Banega has to start as he is the only player in the team that is of a similar quality to the Croatian midfield comprising of Luka Modric, Ivan Rakitic and Mateo Kovacic. Ever Banega is the only player in the squad with the ball carrying abilities and passing range needed to initiate attacks.

  198. el piojo, u are right about fazio vs rojo who should not even be in russia at all ! : Whatever happens I hope Sampaoli won’t announce the lineup early this time. Fazio really needs to play to help combat the strong and beast in the air Mandzukic. He should have played against Iceland too and then you could use Rojo against Nigeria if you want because of the three teams it is the only one where Fazio’s lack of speed would be noticed. Both Croatia and Iceland are not fast in attack so there was or is no need for Rojo.

  199. Still 2 crimes in this line up:
    1) di Maria is still there as lo celso will replace Meza not the worst player we have Di Maria
    2) Caballero will waste every goal we score by conceding more from stupid errors.

    Come on now we all know the main reason behind sticking with these 2 lame players.

  200. Mik, i hear u man and my thoughts about rojo are worse than yours, sorrt to say ! Also shit scared of willyvagain in the goal ! Mercado might worknor not and if diva and biglia are dropped, which i’m still not so sure about it even i deffinetly won’t let them play again, but unfortunatly can’t change my status with Dumbass coach or is he really the coach at all or just another puppet of many other’s before ? Who know’s and actually all i want is must win dirty or beauty, it doesnt matter or bother me at all ! just a win no matter what it will cost us because everyone knows what happen’s if we dont win ? another bloody wasted 4 years for nothing to or talk more ! : How on earth can Rojo cope with the Croatian attack? No idea, Its suicidal, I am mentally preparing for another heartache, to cut short my world cup season, After Argentina then there is nothing left in the WC for me. Crapppp, Waited for 4 years. Or am i being too negative. Do something to get to second round guys. Caballero & Rojo please don’t make catastrophic errors.

  201. Whatever happens I hope Sampaoli won’t announce the lineup early this time. Fazio really needs to play to help combat the strong and beast in the air Mandzukic. He should have played against Iceland too and then you could use Rojo against Nigeria if you want because of the three teams it is the only one where Fazio’s lack of speed would be noticed. Both Croatia and Iceland are not fast in attack so there was or is no need for Rojo.

    • Sampaoli is a nervous guy, he did admit that he did not read much comments and bored with long reading articles. So he is used to instant and simple task including a very quick announcement of his squad. Iceland knows a week ahead who will be the starting XI and work on it to counter. So desperate.

  202. No loose ends pls; I have doubts about Rojo & Tagliafico on the left; Can’t guarantee if Armani will do well in such a high pressure match;
    Every one must give their 100% and have to play as if their life depends on that;

    Croatia’s coach already making statements that he has couple of tricks planned for ARG;
    Being compact at the back and hit on the counter?

  203. copying my comment from previous thread as my thirst to get some feedback was not satiated 😉

    Sampaoli has gone terribly wrong and now he’s got into a place where it’s really difficult to make it through the group…. you can’t win Croatia with biglia…. and you need to find space for world class player..dybala…. compatible and all that is crap…. it would be fine if Argentina had world class midfielders… then you drop dybala…. but we are taking about biglia who won’t make most Asian starting 11 teams…. so dybala well provide more balance simply by bringing at least one player to him….. sampo should have done this… i don’t see any other team leaving any good player out of their starting 11….biglia out and dybala in has to happen…aguero proved why Higuain should be kept away from starting 11… i am a crazy fan of Messi but clearly he has a mental block with penalties… similar to Higuain with one on one chances…. unfortunately Messi is the most talented by leaps but mentally clearly not amongst the best….. but i liked his very matured comments post match yesterday… he’s becoming a bit of a leader which is good…. in all the practise sessions and photos i hardly see Messi with dybala and that makes me suspicious that Messi friend theory is probably true… also samp making cryptic statements such as this is Messi team again and again…. point is the ability is the in the team… they need to come together.. put the best players on the field and hope for the best… hope because they hardly played a fixed 11 in the last 4 years…. so obvious it won’t be a well oiled team…but samp and Messi both better make sure they put the best 11 on the field for the sake of the lovely footballing nation and fur Messi and his fans like me

  204. Much better squad compare with Iceland game. But still did not understand with Sampaoli’s selection. Our defense is the weakest point, need to bring a proper players that they used to play and practiced at their club weekly. Rojo cannot be the CB as well Salvio is a pure winger. I did not why all the Arg coach become so clueless, insane and lost the common sense when they took charge as national coach. Pasarella,Pekerman,Bielsa,Tata and now Sampaoli. Only Sabella have a proper plan and clue. Thanks for his final 2014.

    Ansaldi over Salvo/Mercudo is a good decision so did Fazio over Rojo. As for the GK Sampaoli should work on his mind and heart which one is the right and can be rely – Willy or Armanni ? I will definetly pick up Armanni instead of shaky and unconfidence Willy. Pavon over Maria and Lo Celso over Biglia are correct choice. Need to increase the tempo from the mid field so we need the young bloods. Dybala can be introduce. Masche can only play for 45 minutes and be replace with Enzo / Banega. This is do or die match so be ready to accept the result. No heart break as we know where is the error and mistake why Arg keep falling to win the WC. We have waited and being fooled too long by all this superstar players and coach

    As a fans we can keep our faith and prayers that miracle happen to La Albicelete on this WC. May the divine hands bring the luck to save the team.

    • I watched Willy every week while he was at Malaga and even then while was a great shotstopper he had issues with commanding the backline. Nowadays he is past his prime and lost speed and ball security. Armani can’t be worse than Willy who seems to only be starting because he can pass but even in that department he was shaky.

  208. How on earth can Rojo cope with the Croatian attack? No idea, Its suicidal, I am mentally preparing for another heartache, to cut short my world cup season, After Argentina then there is nothing left in the WC for me. Crapppp, Waited for 4 years. Or am i being too negative. Do something to get to second round guys. Caballero & Rojo please don’t make catastrophic errors.

      • if we use 4-3-3 system which is suitable for messi &co

        ——–armani——–
        mercado—— otamandi —— fazio ——- tagli

        ——— di maria ——- mash ——– lo celso——

        ———messi ———- aguero ———– pavon —–

        this is the very good formation where the dimaria was used in midfield on sabella era.
        if we use this definitely this team can give thread to all the team.
        maria is a left footed player when he is playing on right foot he can make long shots also very well link with messi and aguero. he can split the defence too.
        dimaria is very good player but coaches are not understand his position. when he was in real Madrid he has proved he is worth while plying on right midfield. that same thing is in PSG too.

  210. I’m fed up with sampaoli .
    How can we win with this line up ? Caballero at the back means we are done. .
    Armani should be at the goal post .
    And dybala should play for God’s sake . What point does sampaoli see in this line up…
    We should go out with 4 3 3
    _Armani_
    Mercado ota. Fazio. Tagli
    Masche
    Dybala celso
    Messi pavon
    Kun
    This will do it and 4 3 3 is the best possible line up for argentina …
    Tata martinos argentina was far better than this one .
    Sampaoli he never fields our best possible team and I think he forgot the fact that we are playing in. A world cup ..
    I wish messi wins the wc but it’s not possible with this team.

    • I agree this is the line up he should go for. I probably said it million times: di maria won’t be dropped due to his alliance with Messi.

      • That is not fair to Messi, he doesn’t dictate who plays or doesn’t play. Sampaoli is responsible. They have had plenty training, he should be able to field the best possible team. And for the most part it’s fairly clearly to everybody. LoCelso, Banega And Pavon must be in the lineup. Dybala must come in, if not starting right away, at some point. You put him an Pavon up front, two fast paced and talented young guns, no defense can stop them the entire game. So Sampaoli must assume responsibility.

      • well, did you see them training?? Did they spend more than twenty days working together working???On what then?? Flipping burgers??

  212. I am very happy for the line up ……

    At least he made couple of changes…….

    I still doubt the potential of meza after first game……he seems very week physically ……but he has good skills though……if meza don play well bring Enzo Perez and push lo celco front

    Mercado will do a grt job in defence he is a bull great physically…….meza don’t have to fall back so much…..

    Now with this team we don’t win against Croatia …..we don’t deserve to be at the world cup…..even though we go through we will get fucked up by France or spain…….hope they perform well and prove us all wrong…….

  213. Ansaldi would have been better. And the first one needed to be replaced was Caballero.
    Even if he is as good with feet as Ter stagen, still there is no logic in keeping him. Romero was 5_6 times better than this senior citizen. Romero was one of the best in pushing the ball away. Senior citizen is the worst in the world for that right now..

    Armani’s reflexes are good. He’s a decent gk.
    Any way, River plate starter can’t be worse than our senior citizen..
    Keeping him is a horrible decision.
    Also If meza can’t do anything in first half, hope dybala comes in.

  215. If this is true then it’s good news but then it also means that Rojo is still there, which is remarkable!! It must be heaven to play for this argentine side because you can crap the bed in every game and still get selected!
    Mercado is a solid choice but i really must wonder why Ansaldi isn’t being selected, especially since he’s by far Argentina’s best attacking fullback, which sadly isn’t saying much and his last starting match was against Croatia where he scored a screamer if im not mistaken.

  217. We need a miracle to win against Croatia in a high pressure do or die game with our vulnerable defense, shaky goalkeeping, confused coach and DIMARIA. Positive thinkers and posters are damn sure Croatian team won’t park the bus so they are relaxed we will outscore them. The whole world knows we have hard time breaking park bus defense but positive posters will say no no no … No no nopeeeee Croatia played attacking football against Nigeria. No no no… They will not do that unfair thing to us.. No no no noooooo….The truth is Croatia will sit back and attack and god forbid if they happen score first then we are done done DONE!!!! Our weak and zero chemistry defense won’t be able to handle Croatian counters with our Midfield in opposition’s half!! That loss means we crash out from the world cup without even playing 3rd game as Iceland most likely will beat overconfident Nigerians. But again our positive thinkers will then bring 2022 world cup preparation while playing against Nigeria in our last game . We can give our youngesters some world cup exposure and mentally prepare them for next world cup.

    Croatians are 10 times more clinical and their counters will be lethal!!!!! Did you not see Rojo’s back pass to Caballero?? Thats says everything about our team chemistry and level of understanding our defense has with each other. Whenever Iceland attacked us on counters instead of marking the players in the box our defenders gather around the goalkeeper!! Is that how professional defenders play??? The coach is clueless about breaking the park bus defense. But again mr B postives are like no body can do anything against a team that play with 10 defenders you know!!!!! You knowwwww!!!! We got atleast 1 point against Iceland. We have 2 more games left you know!!! Even if we somehow manage to draw next game we are doomed!! Didn’t Sampoli already know Iceland were going to play with 10 defenders? He was waiting for Dimaria to do some magic till 80th minute. He had 5 days continuos training with yesterday’s team and he couldn’t see playing Biglia was like playing with one less player. Biglia was playing for Iceland team against us yesterday.Some of you guys either are casual fans or you watch football every 4 years because apparently you have no clue how extremely difficult it is going to be against Croatia next game. Track record of our players shows they are not good in handling high pressure situations like this one. Only hope is that penalty miss yesterday will bring out the monster inside Messi!!!! Baldy got us in this situation.If we crash out Baldy will solely be responsible!!!!

    • Shut the fuck up, and see the VHS videos from your favourite WC 2002 😀 Or the mighty 2006 version, which cannot beat any of the strong opponents, not even Mexico. And before the WC lose against Croatia and England too. (conceeded 3-3 goals) Pekerman the genius 😀 In Confed Cup too, cannot beat Mexico, and were trashed by Brazil B, and Pekerman peak match vs Germany Messi, Aimar on the bench, the team leader Riquelme out, the tactical genius…

      • You shut up Hermaphrodite. Who the fuck has mentioned anything about your gay partners from 2002 or 2010? Go lick Sampaoli’s ass!!

    • They will play conservative but their style has always been attacking & the characteristic of their players aren’t like iceland so they can’t park it like the bodybuilders.

    • Sorry but I’ll always be really angry when people cry for idiots like Pekerman. I cant imagine Sampaoli omit a world class right back than Zanetti , rather he would be the happiest man on the earth.

    • I agree with you on most of the things but I believe Argentina vs Croatia won’t be as difficult as Argentina vs Iceland. Croatia won’t be that disciplined and park the bus. I want Mercado, Fazio, otamendi and Rojo as back four because of aerial balls to mandzukic. We need the defence to be solid. Pavon, aguero and Messi should lead the attack. Mascherano, meza and Lo celso/Banega in the midfield. Dybala to come on for meza in the second half and higuain for aguero if necessary. Dimaria too for Pavon if needed which would not likely happen. Sampaoli needs to work on the defence. He needs to play the back four of Mercado, Fazio, otamendi and Rojo. Rojo as left back and Mercado as right back with otamendi and Fazio in central defence. Ansaldi on standby. He should work on the defence well because in knockout stages, defence win you matches. Score and defend well. I think Argentina will beat Croatia.

      • Back four should be solid and Mercado, Fazio, Otamendi and Rojo should play. Last world cup Rojo played as left back. Nobody is questioning Tagliafco. What was his contribution in the game? I felt Tagliafco is equally bad as Biglia. The most counter attacks and goal was from left side. So remove Tagliafco immediately and play Rojo in that position.

    • I agree with you on most of the things but I believe Argentina vs Croatia won’t be as difficult as Argentina vs Iceland. Croatia won’t be that disciplined and park the bus. I want Mercado, Fazio, otamendi and Rojo as back four because of aerial balls to mandzukic. We need the defence to be solid. Pavon, aguero and Messi should lead the attack. Mascherano, meza and Lo celso/Banega in the midfield. Dybala to come on for meza in the second half and higuain for aguero if necessary. Dimaria too for Pavon if needed which would not likely happen. Sampaoli needs to work on the defence. He needs to play the back four of Mercado, Fazio, otamendi and Rojo. Rojo as left back and Mercado as right back with otamendi and Fazio in central defence. Ansaldi on standby. He should work on the defence well because in knockout stages, defence win you matches. Score and defend well. I think Argentina will beat Croatia…..

    • Man SulaV you are one hell of a depressing negative fan! You won’t get anywhere in life with your negativity and anger, we drew and yes we should have won! but a lot of the other top teams drew and lost! – you have some valid points but you also chat some shit! Iceland finished above Croatia in the qualifier group. Don’t support Argentina when they win and then be a negative fickle fan when results don’t go our way. #fixup

      • I am so sorry for disappointing you more than Sampaoli. If I need some lessons on how to live my life I’ll contact you oh great philosopher and greatest Argentine fan ever and legedary Mundo blogger!!

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