Argentina national team coach Lionel Scaloni speaks after 2-0 win vs. Austria, Lionel Messi

1. This Argentina team reminds of arsenal this season. Excellent defense.. The great attack may betray you but good defense never does. See what happened to arsenal. They prioritised attacking football for decades but titles never showd up. This season they focused on keeping their defense intact and they won EPL and almost won UCL. I hope lautaro, alvarez and almada finds their scoring against jordan. That will boost confidence.

2. On the wingers point, it’s true we don’t have ADM-type of players anymore – wingers who run down the flanks and cross or pass the ball in. But then again, we also need to look at who we have in the box. At some points of the match, we kept passing the ball amongst the back and midfield 6. Constant probing. But we all kinda know how we are going to penetrate – find an opening and pass coz our players like the ball at their feet. Hopefully this doesn’t make us too predictable. Thoughts?

   • We have only one player who is similar in profile of dimaria but much less skills and quality that is Nico gonzalez

3. Just read what he says ( thanks so much for the translation as always) above about the match, the team and GoAT. Scaloni’s assessment above is ever so grounded, humble and respectful of opponent, and calm without ever coming across as overly confident or pessimistic. With the mature players that we have, I would like to think this sentiment/ mentality of grounded and calmness and the “stick to our principles, stay to our game plan and we should have the player(s) to win it” mentality resonanltes across the team. No prima donnas or attention seekers. I’d say well done and half the battle won.

   Full agree with all comments here thus far too – workrate our our midfielders, Medina (I didn’t cry over why not Acuna but I didn’t know about Medina as well. But just looking at how he’s played I’d say so far quite ok! looks like Cuti – tanned, tatoo-ed, tough is a bonus!), rotating the squad for next match and Austria are no pushovers.

   VAMOS ARGENTINA!

4. When Leo gets fired up, everyone gets fired up. — This statement bothers me. The concept of playing the World Cup and competing to hold the cup in air should fire up the likes of Lautaro and Alvarez. We cannot expect Messi to score and win games for us in every match. Alvarez should have scored. He had many options. He chose to hit hard at the keeper.

   • Every Argentina player looks like a worse version of themselves under Simeone. De Paul looks better than he did in 2022. Back then, his contribution was mostly pressing and chasing tirelessly. This time, it looks like he’s also offering good ball playing ability again. Similar to 2021 depaul

     The sooner Alvarez leaves Simeone, the better. It’s just sad. Two of our main starters ( almada ) decided to join Atletico and became worse than they used to be. Predictably.

5. The team played a good game and neutralized the opponent. The team learns to play with and without the ball and strong mentally to compete against any team. I am not worried that Messi is the only player scoring right now, but I certainly believe Alvarez, Lautaro and Nico Gonzalez will score when it matters most. Austria played a very strong game, but our midfield and defense worked tireless to neutralize their attacks. Medina, Almada and Lautaro contributed well today and will improve much more as the competition progresses. Argentina is strong mentally, emotionally and playing well. This team is different from any other team in the past and I like the way the team approaches every game. McAllister work rate is undeniable and I like our midfield (De Paul, McAllister and Enzo) these guys rocks! Go Argentina

6. 2022: Argentina had a better attack thanks to Di Maria, Alvarez being in much better form, and Messi still having the legs to contribute heavily as a playmaker. Even when he wasn’t scoring, Messi was creating and influencing games from deeper positions.

   The downside was the defense. We conceded quite a few goals, largely because Otamendi wasn’t reliable enough and looked gassed after 50–60 minutes.

   2026: The attack looks more limited. There isn’t much width, and Messi has adapted his game to focus more on movement to be in right place in the right time rather than dropping deep and orchestrating play like he used to.

   On the other hand, the defense looks far more solid this time around. In that sense, this team reminds me of Argentina in 2014.

   I don’t know if we’ll win the whole thing, but we’re definitely a serious contender nonetheless. I just wish Scaloni had picked Buendia to add some width and creativity on the left side.

7. It’s funny how, when Scaloni chose Medina over Acuna, so many Argentina fans trashed him. People came up with conspiracy theories that Acuna was dropped because of a feud with Paredes and that the inner circle just wanted him out of the group.

   Now you can see exactly why Medina was picked, can’t you?

   See the pass Medina made today. See how he defended. This performance surpassed anything Acuna has ever produced for Argentina.

   I’m sorry, but don’t ever come up with garbage conspiracy theories. Trust Scaloni. How many times have people pushed the “Messi and friends” nonsense only to end up eating their own words afterward?

8. That’s the longest that I have Scaloni comment on his team’s play.
   I hope Messi takes the positive out of missing that pk just like he did In Qatar vs Poland and never missed again.
   Almada played well, we all saw how he let that ball pass through his legs for Messi.
   Nico should have scored that header and Austria had a lot of blocked shots as well.
   I personally would love to see Messi scoring more goals but the rest as well.
   I would let the BOSS rest the next game and play Paz, maybe Barco and HOPE Cuti is fine but then again they have the luxury to rest their big guns and let others showcase what they have.
   As always, LET’S GO ARGENTINA, take it one step at a time and play smart.

9. This was a decent result against a decent European side, playing modern football. Scaloni’s Argentina does not always want to have possession for possession’s sake, sometimes we are happy to let the opponent give it a go, but our defense is pretty strong. Dibu only had to make one real save, that’s it. We created a lot more chances and pretty early on, let’s not forget that Lautaro was through on goal and was brought down only 12 minutes after kick off.

   Austria impressed in their qualifying campaign, I am not sure why some expected us to thrash them like they are Lichtenstein or Andorra.

   • I don’t think anyone was expecting a thrashing. Enzo, De Paul, and Nico González all had good games. But there is no excuse for the poor finishing in front of goal. Enzo and Nico G need to be more clinical, and what a horrendous miss by Julián Álvarez, he took forever to get his shot away when he had an open goal. These kinds of missed chances can be the difference between winning and losing, or even elimination from the tournament.

10. Euro 2024

    Netherlands 2 vs Austria 3.

    Two games 1 shot on target from the opponents. Argentina is yet to concede a goal. Before it was the scary Algerians, watch out for those pacey wingers, Ha, they defeated the Netherlands in Amsterdam right before the WC, that didn’t pan out, they had zero shot on target. Next, it was the big and tall Austrians, Argentina will likely struggle against them on set pieces and corner kicks, they had one shot on target from a direct freekick, comfortable height and save for Martinez.

    No team at this year’s World Cup is looking forward to playing against Argentina before the final.

    “it was an excellent match,” I agree with this statement. Austria is better than Sweden, Turkey, Belgium, Bosnia, Czechia, Croatia (2026) etc. for the Euro teams at this year’s World Cup who are not a part of the strong contenders, Austria is the strongest in this category. I see a team in Argentina who defended a lead against a strong opponent, staying organized for 90 plus minutes. Messi doing what he does best, could not ask for anything more. Job well done. Another decisive win.

    • If you look at the statistics, it’s an excellent result. Two goals, clean sheet and Austria basically couldn’t create any decent chances. Arg missed a penalty, on a better day, result could be even better.

      But concern is the result is the sole output of Messi. Nico, Alvarez and Lautaro – they all missed easy chances. Our defense also looked nervous at times. I think Argentina defense is still highly vulnerable to pressure and late goals.

11. Medina has a great game today both offensive and defensive. Now only one yet to.fimd rhythm is Almada.
    I would like Alvarez starting ahead of Almada against Jordan.

12. Any news about Cuti ?

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