Argentina XI, Emiliano Martinez, Lionel Messi, Nahuel Molina, Guido Rodriguez start

By
Roy Nemer
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177

Argentina will line-up vs. Uruguay in a 4-3-3 with three changes from the team that started the first Copa America match.

Lionel Scaloni has made three changes from the last match as Nahuel Molina replaces Gonzalo Montiel, Cristian Romero replaces for Lucas Martinez Quarta and Guido Rodriguez for Leandro Paredes. Molina replaces Montiel which means he will be able to link-up with Udinese team mate Rodrigo De Paul.

Cristian Romero is back following a muscle strain and replaces Martinez Quarta, who did not have a particularly good match. Guido Rodriguez is in for Leandro Paredes who is suffering from a knock to his ribs. Here is the starting XI:

Emiliano Martínez; Nahuel Molina, Cristian Romero, Otamendi, Marcos Acuña; De Paul, Guido Rodríguez, Lo Celso; Messi, Lautaro Martínez and Nicolás González.

The five players left out of the squad are Lisandro Martínez, Agustin Marchesín, Julián Alvarez, Nicolás Domínguez and Angel Correa.

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177 Comments

  1. j.correa is not bad.. if ocampos was in his place i’m sure ocampos would frequently lose balls in such situation bcs he is not as good as j.correa ball in his feet… j.correa needs adjustment and chemistry with messi which is missing.. otherwise he didn’t did anything wrongs… in second half attack goes to sloppy when lautaro nico in presence.. sometimes messi too

        • A physical target man is very much needed, Alario would also be useful to have for more options but from a tactical perspective a big target man as well

          • When messi in team argentina needs all round striker. Something like good dribbler don’t depends on others create chances for him good in air better brain decent finishing etc… Icardi will not adapt in such criteria though his finishing superb icard wont adapt chemistry with messi team…. It may hear to bad argentina needs better version of higuen but very good in finishing

          • will gaich going to be play in pique position with his physical appearance gaich needs lot way to developed.. he is yet not inpressed with under 23 team.. girotti is better than gaich… the number of matches gaich plays in international level he should be more improved but it didn’t happens or shown yet.. there is sometimes brain and movement requires alongside of physical appearance

  2. Icardi,kun Aguero and Alario kind of players are needed in no.9 position not overrated Lautaro Martinez.Argentuna midfield is looking good so now no need for Lautaro until he level up his finishing. Icardi would be best for this team and then Aguero and Alario.

    • Icardi is not picked at the time he was superb..
      still he is very good
      but but but
      that ugly thing behind the scene of his selection

    • Lautaro will start every match. Until he gets tired of the matches. Alario could have been better as sub in this type of match. Aguero may be not fully fit. We need him for the KO stage. Icardi..no coments. Hes not part of this team..!!
      Dybala should have been in the squad. Hes still a world class player even though hes out of form.

      • I thought there was a rule where any player can be called up at any moment for Copa right? Can’t they exercise this on a new striker? To be honest I doubt Scaloni would at this point but it certainly would be nice. Dybala… Gaich… Simeone or Avila if desperate…

        • that rule can be used only on a valid injury.
          The 4th GK , Alvarez & Nico Dominguez selection over Dybala/ICardi , Gaich/girotti , Buendia will always be a selection mystery which keeps up with the legacy of selection follies made by our previous managers😉.

  4. I personally felt bad when Ocampos was removed from squad after a bad display in a half..

    today we see J.Correa worst player at that position..

    even Papu Gomez is a good option

    • J correa is played out of position. He is not a cf. His max impact is as second striker in a 4-4-2. A match sharp aguero will solve all our issues here. We can start with nicog – lautaro- messi & move to aguero displacing one from nicog/lautaro in 2nd half & formation can be wide or narrow depending on who comes out

  5. most of the player seems to be tired….
    paredes could be more effective in place of palacious offensively..
    di maria was good
    j. correa has some run
    but it’s seems there is some lack in chemistry with messi. may be j.correa task become difficult due to lautaro didn’t put pressure in early

  6. This team slowly starting to look like the 2014 team,we cannot be scared not having the ball
    We need a proper 9 like icardi or kun
    Or alaric to kill off games when we are ahead and under pressure.

  9. I’ve been saying this like a broken record.
    He’s our biggest liability.
    With a proper #5
    We should be able to defend and attack
    Without exposing the defense

  10. Emi Martinez is also good in off ball activities like wasting time. With Emi Martinez in between the goal every defence looks good. Zero shot on goal with player like Suarez and Cavani.Argentina defence is good

  11. Lesson From Today’s match:

    Today Uruguay was Crap they could of played another 500 Minutes they still wouldn’t have a shot in Target,but they will qualify for next round and they’ll get better

    It’s clear the team more balance with a Defensive Midfielder

    I’ve said previously that midfield trio of (parades-DePaul-Locelso) wouldn’t work

    Tagliafico should never be in a Squad again let alone be in a Starting

    Improved performance but Still lots of question marks all over The Fiekd
    Defence still Look shaky and nervous Nico Gonzalez and Lautaro and Lo Celso looked very tired Already.

  12. Guido should start next match also. Molina as well. All the newly selected players like Molina, emi, Romero are performing well. Scaloni should drop lautaro next match he is not in form. He should come as a sub.
    De paul, Emi, Romero, may be Molina are the real talent.
    Vamos Argentina

  13. Acuna is looking good defensively too he made many good runs in defensive half he is good both in offence and defence and his first touch is awesome. Need not to worry about Left Back,Acuna,Tagliafico are enough.

    • If LoCelso fit..yes he lost.
      He was the one of first player in Scaloni’s book. But he is liability in sngle DM role. He can play as CM in 433 if LoCelso not fit. Currently, I would prefer him over Palacios.

      Lautaro-Aguero
      Messi
      Paredes-Guido-DePaul

      There is a chance this team play against Paraguay. And Paredes subbed off later for a winger if we need to go more attacking.

  15. •Molina adds something with his speed
    •Nico was exhausted and useless in the second half.
    •defense was solid besides a careless tackle by Rodriquez in the box that was a penalty for cavani
    •de Paul was a work horse
    • acuna is our left back
    •We need a possession midfielder
    • we won like traditional Italy …defensively

    !!!winning ugly is better than losing pretty!!!

  16. Messi can not play that many matches over 90’

    And again no Aguero our only Striker who can score…

    And I have to say again we really miss Dybala… After the change from Li Celso again the only one creating anything is Messi. And since Messi is the only one who can score in the front Line, he can not create everything and score…

    Defense was good not a single Shot on Goal… Stick to those four please

  17. Congrats ! what a relief ; second half looks worried, lucky we won the game. A 1-0 is worth enough due to great first half. Di Maria did an excellent job on his subs role; should have scored. A better performance than the previous Chile match. My MOM is ‘de Paul. So did Acuna and Molina. Romero is just superb and fulfill the missing puzzle. A credit goes to Guido

    Hope it will be getting better against Bolivia and QF.

  18. man of the match performance today
    rodrigo de paul
    emi martinez

    and it can be easily seen how much effective di maria in second half..
    guido romero otamendi good holding back

    weakness is:
    molina and acuna lost some possesion but can be ignored for improvement..
    palacious as substitute is not impressive.. palacious is like holding back but locelso like more aggressive
    messi creates some impressive momentum. and some momentum he could kill the game.. argentina has some good ball recovery in opponent half but couldn’t convert them into goal..
    j. correa needs to more chemistry with messi

  19. We have to salute our defense after this match. They left kavani and Suarez in no man’s land for most the game. I’m very happy with this starting lineup.

  20. We have no No. 9. Kun won’t press the way Scaloni wants or isn’t match fit. Guido was the Man of the match with a goal and a solid performance. Paredes may have lost his spot.

  22. Our best players were De Paul and Guido for me. Uruguay did not show up to play football or we shut them down. Cavani and Suarez were staved off service. Lautaro form is a concern because Joaquin is not a number 9 and Kun is not match fit to last 90 minutes.

  24. Happy with the win, but shocked by the decline in performance in the 2nd half. We created almost nothing, lost possession all the time, were sloppy and only shot on goal once. Even Messi was way below par. In short, plenty of room for improvement.

    • Messi was superb…..I was never a huge fan of Messi but today I have become one of his admirers. The way he was running and dribbling, today we’re seeing Messi as a leader, leading by the example, pressing ,running. I just love him now.

      • I watched only second half and I can definitely appreciate his play, leading from the front. He must be truly happy with the victory, for all the efforts he and his team mates had put in the match.

      • This comment shows how futile ur mindset is Shubham.
        Messi is the greatest Argentine player ever and is arguably the best player ever to play the game, you are not a fan of his but fan of some trash talents like Palacios who don’t even start for mighty Leverkusen.

  25. A win is a win! I’ll take it. However, I saw Correa walking I’m curious to see what people see in Correa versus Martinez. Serious question not bashing ..

    I hope Acuña has earned his spot. e Martinez and Romero are beasts in the back .

    Palacios did well as sub.. Messi is Messi, should have passed some but oh well

    Guido is a monster. Never seen him play but enjoyed it. Love the partnership with de Paul. One of these two were definitely man of match

  27. Grateful for the win, today I felt guido is much better and more confident then paredes.

    I just don’t understand what the problem is, why do we struggle so much to create a decent play and putting it in the back of the net???
    Lautaro is off, completely off. He struggles and he looks lost and not confident when he has the ball in the area.

  28. Joaquin did nothing…shouldve brought in angel correa…and messi should have squared the ball to di maria….he had the chance to kill the game 🙁 I am a big fan of messi though….VAMOS ALBICELESTE

  30. Messi I love you, but you could of easily killed the game off

    He could of easily square it to Di Maria.

    Hate it when players do that even if it’s Messi

  32. Lately, we always switch to defensive mode after scoring… which is not our strong part. We need to playing attacking game which suits us..hope we don’t concede here

  35. even commentator understands it’s needs to bring j.correa for lautaro.. but why is delaying,, scaloni has smart minds but it is not understandable why he is delaying some moment

    • Man..No-one can do what Lautaro is doing for team. He’s a hard working striker. But he’s in bad form. Hope he starts scoring goal as soon as possible.
      I will stick with Lautaro even if he’s not scoring.

  37. We looked good for the first 45 minutes isnt it? Kudos to Scaloni for the changes.

    Havent seen our RB taking a shot at the goal in ages like Molina did even though he is defensively not that good and has been dispossed few times. But will have to see how he survives today. And our Left side of attack is much better than the Right side. Right side is completely dry.

    I really like Nico Gonzalez who looks like a unique player for us. With him and Acuna even swaping positions sometimes Nico is even seen defending now we can see Why Scaloni even started Nico as a LWB in a 3-4-3 way back he and Acuna makes the left side far more active.

    Otamendi easily conceded a Corner soon after we scored a goal. How can a veteran defender like him be so irresponsible? Lautaro again looks dead average till now. Nico is offering much more than Lautaro at this point. Guido looks an interesting choice too he is constantly getting into the middle of the defence like Mascherano, Paredes also does that to be fair. But Guido looks good till now.

    Have to say this, how long is Tabarez the coach of Uruguay, 10 plus years? The guy is in stick and is still does the coaching. I mean think about it we had like 7 coaches in the same time span in the last decade and Uruguay is still haveing the same coach.

    • I too feel the same, he never scored before.
      But we all know, he had scored awesome goals for us. I will give some more chances to the boy, Aguero can’t play full 90 minutes like him at this point with 75% of the work rate he can put in. I love both of them, but I feel we need Lautaro as much as Lautaro’s desire to perform

  40. Good first half; need to subs Lautaro and Nico; bring Kun and Angel or Papu to speed up in front attackers; and bring Palacios to replace Lo Celso. Always, the best defense is a good offense !

  41. Solid Game so far

    Defense is doin a great Job, I mean there’s Cavani, Suarez and Valverde and they did not have a real chance in the first 45…

    But we have to take out Nico, I’m a big fan but today he’s tired and not present… Maybe Lautaro can be replaced as well.. But yet again Scaloni is probably gonna take out Lo Celso again and bring Palacios..

    we need one or two more Goals now let’s goooooo

  42. gonzales seems to be tired but still he is good but he needs to repaced today match.. but lautaro impression wasn’t good today.. i think argentina miss alario type of striker today

  43. very good first half.. Lautaro Martinez keeps missing good chances to score..Gonzalez is not so bad also..
    But we need a striker replacing Lautaro now..such miss may punish us..Messi is best as usually..
    I am little worried about defence but till now it is solid

    Locelso Guido DePaul are very good

    Acuna is greater than Tagliafico
    Molina is exciting

    Want to see Kun Aguero messi combination up front ..

  45. Lot are complaining about Lautaro. I must say, the kind of strategy we are playing you need someone who can run alone like crazy and press. There is no one like Lautaro who can give that industry alone. It’s not easy to play 30 yards without any support.

    Yes he has missed chances in last few games but no one can replace him now, unless Scaloni changes his strategy

  46. I’ll bet that after the Foyth error trying to dribble, Scaloni has instructed EVERYONE to always clear it. “Don’t bother dribbling, just kick it to Mars”

  47. few of the players are playing well especially emi, molina, guido, locelso, gonzales and messi. rest are dumped yard. the players are playing upon the coach rrestriction. that is what they are not moving the ball fast forward. otamendi is all the time creating the paressure on emi thru back passes, acuna always running like headless chicken, de paul not CM material, latauro useless and he missed the chance of muslera bound while messi target goal.
    200% brazil is the winner of 2021 copa.
    in this match uruguay is better than argentina. uruguay playing buildup play. players re moving the ball forward from GK. no kick in the aiir all the time.

    uruguay might be chance to win this match. either it might be draw or win by uruguay.

    scaloni and his staffs are dump yard. this is said demise to AFA and claudio topia.
    messi, plz forgot your trophies. your career will end with club level trophy no international trophy because of AFA wants to finished your career with trophyless.

  48. 1)Why all the players are passing back to Messi? Its like team is fully dependent on Messi. Why can’t they build a game with out Messi?
    2)Lautaro martinez is the worst player on the pitch. Running like head less. Work rate is high but no brain.
    3)Acuna is not a proper LB. He can not run 90 mins with same speed. Defending skill is not good enough.
    4)Guido is performing good.
    5)Molina is tremendous in attack but he needs to work on defense.

    • Acuna had been pretty good so far. Much better than the one in Right wing. Molina lost balls unnecessarily. And nothing good coming from his attacks, not so promising in defense as well, but surely we have to give him a some time to settle. But Acuna was ok

      • Acuna is still ok but against big opponents he is not the solution. He needs same speed for 90 mins. Needs acceleration. But he is still ok for now

  50. The first 20 minutes were a big improvement over the previous game. The line-up works well, with the exception of Lautaro. We have better strikers than him. Emi in goal is calm and composed. Our best keeper in years. Guido is also an improvement over Paredes.

    We should not hang on to a margin of 1 goal, but push for more to avoid another draw.

  51. Overrated Lautaro Martinez can not make a run for goals and keep playing shit for Argentina. He should be kicked out in half time

  52. The movement without ball while pressing defensively looks good but after the lead they look clueless while having the ball. The movement offensively is awful. Playing always the long ball and hope for the best is not a great solution in my opinion.

    • Not that clueless bro.. Which game are you watching?? Uruguay are doing nothing at all.. Argentina has been compact.. Maybe you are expecting five goals for Argentina in first half or what.?? It’s really like a chess play now.. Argentina should take chances now because they will come as Uruguay tries to attack.. It’s time to hit them hard now

      • I have to agree with Zoroaster… movement without the ball in Attack is bad… Urugauy is pressing us.

        but defense is good today Uruguay had not a real chance so far

  54. Great from Rodriguez to get a goal. This was written for him. Also I am extremely pissed because I could not watch the first fifteen minutes because my streaming service decided to randomly change channel settings. Came the closest I ever have to trying to punch a hole through the wall. It seems from what I could see that Uruguay make it extremely difficult to play out from the back and can immediately gain back possession. Our game plan has to be modified to respond to this next half.

  56. Please Argentina win this match so that no one will come and say that there should have been him for that and that for him.. Why he was not in eleven,why was not he in sqaud.. Now Uruguay will try to attack opening up spaces. This time we should not go to our shell.. Vamos Argentina..

  58. some of the impression of messi was superb but today gonzales seems to be weak and tired may be he needs rest but honestly lautaro didn’t have good impression today

  59. WHY ARE WE MOVING SO SLOW IN THE FINAL THIRD?

    Messi Lautauro and González look al tired and already sweating a river! What’s up with them today? That or the us Ee too relaxed and it feels like they aren’t moving with force!

  66. Brazil gonna win this cup 200% because of our coach & team selection.. don’t know Franco Armani what he did always got place in team either squad or starting xi while he is covid positive continuasly ..why otamendi?? Why not licha??

  68. I like Scaloni’s braveness. The introduction of acuna and Molina especially for tagliafico and Montiel who is so lost going forward, is enough to get me motivated. I only hope otamendi is focused

  70. Good solid attacking line up. I like both the full backs. Goal has to come from being wide. Be careful about penalties.

    Let’s have a great game!

  71. Good line up except Lautaro Martinez, Aguero should have started but there are many matches so in time he will get his spot. This Argentina team lacks striker.No aerial threat in final third except N. Gonzalez

  72. Brazil will definitely win this cup. There is no team close to their talent of players and great coach. All other nine teams left including Argentine are same level and if you take Messi out of the team Argentine will be the worst tram. The most they can get out of today’s match against Suarez is a tie. This stupid coach is killing the team gradually.

  73. It will be interesting to see Guido starting as DM for the first time. Same with Molina as RB. I wish them luck! Happy that Gonzalez can play. Also hope to see Lisandro coming on for Otamendi.
    As Engan said, it’s an attacking line-up and Guido’s defensive solidity should better allow the fullbacks to push forward, while Otamendi, Guido and Romero keep track of Suarez and Cavani

    Excited and nervous about the game! Rio de la Plata derby is always difficult, for both teams… We must convert our chances this match!! We need to win to gain confidence in the team! VAMOS ARGENTINA <3

  76. Ok my early impression. Uruguay will come out with betancur, torriera, valverde and even de la cruz in the middle to crowd out our 3 in the middle as is their typical game. But on the other hand it will allow us to release Molina and Acuna to push into their half spaces with messi and gonzalez. I can sense the idea Scaloni has of attacking their compact structure. Hopefully the front 3 have their scoring boots on today.

    • This could become our 3-4-3 in possession vs Uruguay’s 4-4-2. Their fullback Vina and Gonzales are relatively young and unknown, playing for Penarol and Palmeiras. Nico, Messi, huevo and Molina can ask them questions.

  77. Very interesting. Molina getting his 1st start. All attention would be on guido Rodriguez. I have not watched him much bt many praising here like crazy. Can he be our next Mascherano or kante?? We will see

  78. I’m feeling good tonight. For all you Lautaro haters, tonight he scores.

    3-1 Argentina… goals by Lautaro and Messi.. nico will get an assist as well.

    Not too familiar with Molina but excited to see him play.

    Ota and Romero at CB was a must. I like Martinez and hope he will be the starter next to Romero, but for now we need someone with experience on NT especially versus the duo we’re up against.

    Glad to see Nico and Lautaro starting. Would have been a low moral blow if they were healthy and benched.

    Super excited for the game.

  79. This is an attacking line-up with two attack minded fullbacks! Good to have Guido who can drop deep between CBs I guess if fullbacks push high up if it’s a true 4-3-3.

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