Leandro Paredes comments on which Argentina players surprised him, game vs. Italy, recovery

By
Roy Nemer
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37

Leandro Paredes spoke about which players in the Argentina national team surprised him, the game vs. Italy and his recovery.

Paredes is presently out injured and will miss the rest of the season for PSG. However, he might be available for Argentina in the Finalissima game against Italy.

The match between the Copa America and Euro champions takes place on June 1 at Wembley in London, England. Paredes spoke to Julián Giacobbe on his YouTube channel. Here is what he had to say:

“My recovery? It’s going very well. Time is not in my favor but my idea is to get to the final against Italy. Today, I want to risk it only for that final.”

In regards to which players in the Argentina national team surprised him the most:

“Licha Martínez and Cuti Romero are the players that surprised me the most in the national team. They are physically strong, fast and good with the ball at their feet. They give us a guarantee.”

He also had this to say about the Spanish national team:

“I believe a national team like Spain, that has the ball and move it, can make it very difficult for us.”

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37 Comments

  1. It is also a little irritating that we have not been able to officially announce the list of friendlies atleast for the June window. I saw in TYC that Scaloni has met with the AFA head and most probably finalizing the same.
    From earlier press interactions of Scaloni, it seems that the Argentine coaching staff is considering the June window as the most important camp before Qatar, because, unlike other WC years, the break before the WC will not be long. So the coaches want this to be a 3 week long training camp and I feel we should play all the 4 rumoured matches. Italy, Israel, Brazil and S Korea. Yes, it will involve a lot of travelling but we can akways rotate in the last 3 matches, the result should not be important

  2. I am excited and looking forward to the match against Italy. I do not agree that we should take this very lightly. Its an official match and the trophy is a recognized trophy. I understand, as per the agreement between UEFA and CONMEBOL, atleast three more editions will be played and this is the new name for the Artemio Franchi trophy. We should go ahead with our strongest possible team and win it.

  3. Finallisimo will be forgotten if Argentina wins it, just like when they beat Denmark in 1993 for basically the same thropy with different name.

    But if Italy win it, the Europran journos will claim Poland and Mexico will progress to round 16 haha

  5. And bundeia on the bench for flop coutinho despite his good performance in the last game.. Seems villa fans are also disappoint for this decision

  6. Vs italy.martinez Foyth romero otamendi acuna. Mid. Locleso depaul guido. Att. Messi lautaro ADM.. If licha is fit. Hope he can play instead of guido.. ADM should play. He missed so much finals.

  10. This is the best match for buendia to impress scaloni. But I don’t think he would be included in the starting 11. Coutinho is still favoured by Gerrard. Any way he should play his best football for Aston villa today. Otherwise he won’t get in the squad against Italy. We desperately need buendia. Buendia and palacios are the right players for the back up spot in midfield. Way better than macallister or Lanzini or Dominguez. We have enough defensive minded midfielders. So no need of more.

    • It’s difficult game to charge due Aston villa won’t have much possessions and Buendía is creative player, he is very active when he has the ball even though he works hard without the ball That is one the reasons I believe he can play in midfielder three , he similar player to papu in the regard
      – I’m sure he will be in the squad vs Italy match and other friendly matches, hope scaloni and co try to him to play 1 or 2 friendly games cuz he is that good in my opinion

  12. Licha is fantastic defender, hope he moves better league in this summer, he is good as cuti but less aggressive can’t wait to see cuti and licha partnership at the back for the nt.

    • It would have been nice yes… But this has to be considered…

      Licha 1.75m
      Mascherano 1.74m
      Cannavaro 1.76m
      Passarella 1.73m
      Puyol 1.78m

      What matters is that he is great defensively, good in the air and physically strong. Height didn’t matter much when he pocketed Haaland (1.94m)

      • Yeah I know he is a beast. It just I wonder….imagine how top notch defender he would have been. Our cb position is sorted atleast for another few years for sure. Some pretty exciting young cb is coming up

      • Vikin, i agree but theres a problem when comparing anyone to legends or generational players. Of course if you throw a legends name (puyol) into any discussion you will have solid argument but they are statistical outliers and shouldn’t be compared. Perhaps comparing to current top defenders, not only the absolute best but like top 10-20, is a better way to judge. I think when people complain about Lisandros 5’9″, they’re saying strength, mass, and height are important attributes to help bully attackers and areal ball clearing. Most top center backs today are like 6ft to 6’4″. Theres a reason for that because it does provide advantages. Licha of course doesn’t have aerial issues and is defensibly great so he makes up for it and we do have plenty of examples where shorter CB are just as a good if not better but the general argument still stands, it think.

    • This is the same argument like messi is short so he can’t play football same goes to maradona. Lisandro is good in aerial duels and if Romero and foyth plays and also nico Gonzalez thn we can defend set pieces quite well

      • > This is the same argument like messi is short so he can’t play football same goes to maradona.

        It’s not the same argument for an attacker.

        • Argument was same before maradona came. They changed the perception of attackers so now nobody is much concerned about midfielders or strikers height.

  14. Next month I expect we will finally see Romero and Lisandro starting together.

    For those who followed Licha in his early Ajax days where he played DM, how was he in this position? Closer to destroyer type or deep-lying playmaker?
    I’m wondering because his passing is excellent and seems like he can dictate the tempo of the game well. If he can play the role of deep-lying playmaker, we have a like-for-like option to Paredes in case the role is still needed in a match where Paredes is subbed off

    • A friend of mine is a hardcore Ajax Amsterdam fan, according to him Licha was good as a DM but he is an absolute beast as a CB. I think as a DM he was both excellent in tackle and good in distribution but did not always position himself as a midfielder, he was a bit positionally naïve and not dynamic enough which can be improved I suppose if he plays as a DM on a regular basis. However, I don’t think with Guido as a back-up we really need that. Guido’s long passing is also underrated, he surprised me with his good diagonal passes during Copa which were almost Paredes esque.

      • Good to know, thanks! Ajax fans sure seem to love him. I don’t doubt Guido but I think he is a different type of DM to Paredes and it can affect the flow of our game. Better when defending a lead but if we need goals Paredes passing range and vision is missed. Hence why I was toying with this idea

    • Personally I think Licha can provide almost the same contribution to the attack with his elite passing as a center back than as a DM, so for me it doesn’t matter too much. When you have a ball carrying center back your midfielders don’t have to turn their backs and run back to retrieve the ball so it makes the game much more fluid. Imagine Licha and Paredes at the same time, we’d have so much of the pitch opened up to possible attacks and a huge range of passing from deep. Same with Guido when he plays

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