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Football belongs to the players. Technicians are having more and more incidents, it is true. They are decisive in leading groups, in managing egos in large teams. It is indisputable that the strategy took on decisive value. As real as that with better footballers you are closer to winning. There another value of Scaloni’s National Team is identified: it has more game and more names than everyone in the Copa América. The operation enlarges or shrinks the squad, but individually a leap in quality can be made at a given time. Against Chile it was a tough, close game. Gareca reduced the spaces, goalkeeper Bravo was a figure with the wisdom of his 41 years. But In the end, the Argentine coach replaced one of Manchester City’s 9 with the Inter captain. It was Lautaro Martínez who captured the rebound to break the score, after an appearance in the area by Lo Celso, another of those who entered. And on the next play, El Toro stung it and missed the second after a barbaric assist from Di María, a star who started as a substitute… Even with 5 substitutions, an invention in the pandemic that unfortunately FIFA did not modify, no Garnacho, Manchester United forward, had minutes; Paredes, starting central midfielder in the debut; nor Nico Otamendi, the leader who scored the goal to beat Brazil at the Maracaná. Chile’s best plays were two mid-range shots by Rodrigo Echeverría, Huracán’s very good midfielder. But there he couldn’t go any further. Nobody has a bank like it.
The National Team, even without a devastating brilliance, was superior to its version with Canada and did well to unblock the match earlier.. The difference was at the collective level and in the proper names. Messi, even touched in the adductor, ended with a whip that touched the post, the best collective play of the match. Those flashes of quality, like the corner that the Olympian sought, are above the rest. For that also, Scaloni allows himself changes after winning: he does not match the 11 by heart because it is not his style and because he has several points with even levels. Where there is no other equal is in the arch. When Chile finally showed up, Dibu Martínez ruined Echeverría’s possible night of glory. He is a great national team goalkeeper. He saves at Aston Villa but he could do it at Real Madrid. He has an overwhelming mentality: he lives the 90 minutes waiting for one or two saves. He stretches the best moment of his career. Chile, on the other hand, has already had the best generation in its history, which was champion with Sampaoli in the 2015 Copa América and Pizzi in 2016. Paulo Díaz in his best version is the most reliable center back in Argentine football. But his star is Alexis Sánchez, survivor of that litter, aged 35. In the 0-0 with Peru he made an excellent movement in the area and finished poorly. Now, with Argentina, the center backs did not let him touch them, in addition to being poorly supplied. Cuti Romero and Lisandro Martínez were enormous in the one on one, in the advances, in the marking in attack: they are two butchers dressed in tuxedos.
The levels of the footballers and the teams where they compete is another upgrade of the National Team. First the renovation was managed painlessly. After the 2018 World Cup, with a climate of coup d’état by the players against a coach who had betrayed even himself, there were resignations and the feeling that there was no tomorrow. Despite the first apocalyptic perception, ultimately wrong, the sun rose the next day. It was as Scaloni would say and with Scaloni’s contribution. Even if the faces of the new era were finally not the expected Dybala and Mauro Icardi. At that time, in parallel, it was also pointed out as a mole that the Argentines were not part of the great teams in the world. Now, before and after winning the World Cup, they shine in top places. The National Team in some cases collaborated for that leap. Cuti Romero went from an Atalanta sensation to Tottenham, and now Real is looking at him. Julián went from River to Manchester City, where he stayed to be highly valued by Guardiola. Enzo Fernández was transferred from Benfica to Chelsea as the most expensive player. Mac Allister, smart to play as an inside midfielder or as a starting 5 like in New Jersey, jumped from Brighton to Liverpool. Or the established ones like Lautaro Martínez, the 10th captain of Inter. Or De Paul, who had a very good game with Chile when he had to wake up, who has also felt like an owner at Atlético de Madrid for a while. Messi and Di María no longer count: they are bigger than any team they can go to. Barcelona fell off the map when it pushed Leo…
Those scrolls then have to be taken to the field, of course. They are not going to give him the Cup for being the current world champion or for having more players than Uruguay or Brazil, with a disappointing debut against Costa Rica. In fact, it is repeated so that it does not sound like excessive praise, the National Team just won in the 90th minute. The look is conceptual, an aspect that can be decisive if it follows a line of evolution in the game now already classified and with the great competitors on the other side of the key. It has already become evident that Argentina did not rest on its laurels. After a moment of uncertainty at the end of 2023, when Scaloni confessed that he wanted to see if he still had energy and with rumors of some relaxation situation that had bothered him, the team once again showed the murderous shine in his eyes, as the Black Fontanarrosa. The desire to win again. Messi chose to spend his birthday again concentrating with the team instead of going to a beach with the photo with the World Cup as his cell phone background. Di María, who was going to retire after Qatar, extended his expiration date to this competition. Enzo Fernández underwent surgery to be able to play again for the National Team… It is often said that the most difficult thing is to win after winning. But these players also know that it is the most beautiful thing there is.
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