Argentine’s in the Champions League preview: Lionel Messi visits Diego Maradona’s Napoli

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With the Champions League Round of 16 continuing this week, Lionel Messi’s Barcelona visiting Diego Maradona’s Napoli has stolen all of the headlines.

Threre’s a total of 16 Argentine players remaining in the Champions League, some of which already have a foot in the quarter finals. Here are the Argentine players left:

Atletico Madrid
Coach: Diego Simeone
Angel Correa

PSG:
Angel Di Maria
Mauro Icardi
Leandro Paredes

Atalanta:
Alejandro Gomez
Jose Luis Palomino

Valencia:
Ezequiel Garay

Tottenham Hotspur:
Erik Lamela
Giovani Lo Celso
Juan Foyth
Paulo Gazzaniga

FC Barcelona:
Lionel Messi

Juventus:
Paulo Dybala
Gonzalo Higuain

Manchester City:
Sergio Aguero
Nicolas Otamendi

The matches for this week are:

Chelsea vs. Bayern

Napoli vs. FC Barcelona (Lionel Messi)

Lyon vs. Juventus (Paulo Dybala, Gonzalo Higuain)

Real Madrid vs. Manchester City (Sergio Aguero, Nicolas Otamendi)

The comparisons have been going on all week. Maradona took Napoli to the highest of high’s while playing for them. And now another little Argentine will look to conquer Naples.

Finalists of previous years Juventus will look to take a second leg advantage back to Italy when they clash against Lyon. Paulo Dybala will look to make this tournament his with Gonzalo Higuain as they will want to make another Champions League final.

One of the clash of the rounds involves two other Argentine’s. Sergio Aguero and Nicolas Otamendi will want to vanquish their Champions League demons and eliminating Real Madrid would be a step in the right direction.

44 Comments

  1. Hopefully these CL matches were not the new standard because we saw many lacklustre performances including Dybala and our captain. Was he saving energy for the classico this weekend? Let’s hope so.
    Aguero and Icardi did not come off the bench.
    Only Gomez played a good game.

    • True otamendi is past his prime the Madrid goal did come off the error of Kyle Walker but otamendi shud have cleared it instead of giving a powerful pass to Walker since the opponents were pressing hard n vinicius ghosted past him in one occasion which tells he is a bit slow also. Gabriel Jesus wud literally give the Argentina defense all sorts of trouble if we play otamendi n jokers like rojo

    • Otamendi cleared every aerial balls but he was partialy resposible for opner goal of Madrid.But Otamendi was good apart from that error.

  2. Concacaf champions league
    Atalanta United advances to the quarter finals thanks to Gonzalo Martinez’s brace and an assist n secure his team a 3-1 win.

    Copa libertadores
    Atletico tucumen gets knocked out by losing on penalties in the qualifying round

  3. Paredes was best defensive midfielder in Copa 2019 even better than Casemiro.Why to criticise Paredes then.He may be not getting playing time but still he is influential.Not our all player can be undisputed starter in club team,there is also competition between players.Some needs to sacrifice something for betterment of the club.

    • dude casemeiro is a diffferent style of midfielder compared to paredes. casemeiro is a hard working destroyer but is not tat much of a good passer like paredes .casemeiro’s job is to break attacks do the dirty work and lead the counter attacks he is similar to gattuso. paredes is more of pirlo style he does have a good tackling ability but his work rate is very low unlike casemeiro who is a workhorse n can be seen all over the pitch but paredes vision similar to pirlo is breathtaking.

    • Let’s admit it plain n simple Paredes is utter shit backpass king .Once I hated sampaoli for not selecting him in the world cup squad but Sampaoli was right he is a defensive liability for a team like ours. In 2019 COPA we didn’t had much options so he got the chance but now we have Capaldo, LO CELSO ,G . Rodriguez, Nico Dominguez, ascaciber .

      We have seen how dependence on Messi killed our teams IN THE PAST now we are on the way to be great again we don’t need Paredes ,if Scaloni calls him again he will make the same mistake done by his predecessors which was over dependence on Messi.

      • Capaldo, Ascacibar, Guido LOL next to these nobodies Paredes an unquestionable starter, who the fuck is Capaldo? Ascacibar the guy who were destroyed by a shitty Koeln? Realy? Dominguez, Lo Celso not even DM’s. Our every DM except Paredes are weak.

      • Against Messi-dependency most important to drop useless De Paul, an AM without a single goal, assist and creativity, Palacios-Paredes-Lo Celso midfield our best period, sadly only a mediocre midfield internationaly at best, nothing more.

        • You never stop with your nonsense do you.

          You blaming Ascacibar for the entire team’s loss? so why the hell didn’t you complement him on the prior game where they won and Ascacibar provided an assist? Ascacibar is a great DM and if you bothered to actually watch him play you’d know that.

          Regarding Caplado, well he was fantastic in the pre-olympics but it’s way too early for him, lets see how the olympics go.

          Dominguez not a DM? LOL yeah stop looking at whoscored and start watching football. Nico has evolved his game considerably in the last 2 seasons and is now a b-2-b player but he started out as a DM and can easily fulfill that position.

          DePaul useless? Why because no goals or assists? Exactly what I’d expect from someone who uses pure stats to judge a player rather than actually watching the player…..you know, play! You know Blala you remind me of some people I used to know who said that Zidane, Xavi and Iniesta were overrated because their goals/assists rations weren’t that great!
          This ain’t baseball dude, stats don’t necessarily give you the whole picture and in football they rarely do.
          If you ever wondered how Argentina turned things around in copa it’s because of 2 factors; the first was Lautaro’s introduction and the 2nd was De Paul’s introduction to the midfield. His passing and tireless workrate is what compensates for Paredes’s laziness.

          [Palacios-Paredes-Lo Celso midfield our best period]

          Really Lo Celso? so now you’re ok with Lo Celso ? Because only 2 months ago you were having a go at him for not being able to ‘hack it’ at the BPL. Pretty much the same non sense you spewed when he left PSG and when he was initially being used as a sub at Betis, remember?

          [sadly only a mediocre midfield internationaly at best, nothing more.]

          Yup for someone thinks football is all about stats and big name clubs I’m not surprised, but even if that’s your criteria you’d be wrong.
          Celso is a world class midfielder, Palacios is one of the most talented young midfielders to come out of SA, at least according to outlets like ESPN and Real madrid (who were about to sign him had he not been injured). Lastly Paredes was in the team of the tournament in the last copa America as one of the best midfielders.
          All this does not equate to a ‘mediocre midfield’, not the best midfield mind you but certainly not mediocre and ofcourse you’re going to tell me about how Uruguay and Brazil have superior midfields even though Argentina’s ‘mediocre’ midfield outplayed them in the recent friendlies and before you say they were only friendlies I would like to remind you that in SA and between Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay there is no such thing as as friendly.

          • I want to give props to you @elpipita for bringing sanity and good analytic comments to this forum. Some people come here and spread so much toxicity about many Argentine players who don’t deserve it. We have an abundance of great forwards and midfielders, and plenty of young defenders with huge potential! I can’t wait to see them together in the Argentine shirt further developing the team in WCQ and copa

        • Csabalala,

          you have not to do really anything more to be abhorrent Persona Non Grata in here. Only really stupid person can destroy himself in such easy way you did.

  4. “According to an increasing number of Italian rumours and sources, Argentinian international forward Lautaro Martinez (22) has already agreed terms with Barcelona FC, over a summer move. Blaugrana, planning to replace Luis Suarez with El Toro, and side him to Lionel Messi and Antoine Griezmann, as well as to newcomer Martin Braithwaite, are ready to pay out the whole 111 million euros transfer fee”

    Lautarp-Messi connection is very important.

  5. Now it is just one month for the qualifier match,when Scaloni gonna announce the team?Palomino,Mac Allister,Montiel,Quarta Martinez should be in the team.In recent weeks Lo celso has immensely improved.His passing is one of the best and Premiere league has made him little faster.In coming 2 or 3 year he will be top midfielder.

  6. amazing scenes in talleres vs huracan match
    after being a goal down early talleres equalised through facu medina and completed a turnaround n ended the match 4-2 with nahuel bustos also scoring

  7. Coronavirus outbreak in Italy is very worrying as it would be in ANYWHERE in the world! but thousands of people packed together is idle ground for a disaster.

  8. Garay has major injury…out for the season.

    Di Maria, Lamela, Icardi, and Gomez should be considered in 23 for Copa. Correa having great season and he’s still young but id give the 1st 3 a chance. Ocampos is doing great too. Tough call nonetheless, lots a of great players to chose from!

    • come on man its time to move over di maria .icardi isnt starting for psg anymore cavani has regained his place. gomez and ocampos is a must call both are versatile and can be used in the left flank an area where argentina have lacked quality after di maria’s decline.correa shud also be considered given his versitality,work rate,speed n most importantly his current form for atletico. lamela depends on how he is able to maintain his fitness levels we cant call him up n if he is still injury prone it wud put the team planning into a dissaray which hapenned in the previous world cup n copa america finals where sudden injuries to important players puts coach’s plans n tactics into a dissary as to how to work out a new team formula as u see NT coaches have little time to work with the players n they generally have only one group of players in mind when playing in a tournament and if an important player gets injured in tat grp it spells trouble so player fitness levels must be hugely considered

      • > come on man its time to move over di maria

        Nope. Hes still inform.

        > icardi isn’t starting for psg anymore cavani has regained his place.

        A bit hyperbolic when its only been several games. we all know whats he’s capable of and is easily ranked amongst the worlds best #9s. Its rather short sighted to leave such talent at home or at least not try to integrate. He deserves a solid push especially that Aguero isn’t going to play much longer.

      • Do you understand Rotation Policy, Cavani never starts ahead of Icardi in big matches. Icardi always scored goals for PSG where Cavani just scored in last match even Icardi scored goal as substitute but ruled out as Offside.

    • With kun, Lautaro and la Joya there is no need for Icardi, not yet anyways.
      I love Coco but he’s way too injury prone, cannot be relied on sadly, otherwise he’d be a great backup for De Paul in the midfield.
      Maria I wouldn’t mind, but not as a starter but rather a sub! Ocampos is ahead of him in my book.
      Papu I’d like to see, he totally deserves to play atleast one tournament with Argnetina’s senior team (already was at the 2007 u20). I don’t see a place for him as a starter but I can see him coming in as a sub enganche behind the 2 forwards.

      • Mamoun Gomez is the best inform left winger for Argentina definitely he must be called and must start even in his 30’s he has the pace n trickery to beat defenders n also not to forget his vision and his long range goal damn he is all in all the gem of Argentina scaloni pls don’t bottle this Copa America

        • Ani, I havent seen Papu play much as a LW, infact I don’t remember him ever playing as a left winger. His ideal position is the enganche and if I am all honest I would like to see Celso in that position.
          The thing about this copa is that it going to be much harder than the previous ones where a team has to play 8 games in total to win it! So that’s 2 more games than usual so if Papu gets to go, he’ll see alot of action whether he starts or not. Just remember though Scaloni hasn’t called him up at all so it’s unlikely that he’s gonna start now sadly.

    • I agree on Di Maria, he plays quite differently since last year with PSG, much more like a right playmaker. He can be either Messi’s sub in a 4312 or right midfielder in a 4222. It may sound tricky for Gomez because Scaloni is looking for a more defensive player on the left.

      I think there are 5 places for strikers, Messi, Aguero and Lautaro obviously, Dyabala should have secured his place(much more playing time than Lamela with his club), so it will be between Icardi and Alario. I honestly don’t know, Alario seems to be a more complete player but Icardi can score on 1 shot. If I am Scaloni and I am looking for a sub who is efficient and can score in 5 min, I may go for Icardi.

    • As good as Lamela is , calling him back would be a waste of spot! This guys has a glass body like Lanzini and Gago. He will just be a liability to the team!

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