Lionel Messi Red Card: Watch the incident that led to the Argentine Skipper’s unfair dismissal against Chile on Saturday night.
The 2019 Copa America just hasn’t been the best of days for Argentina Captain Lionel Messi. He only had one goal to his name throughout the tournament and none from open play. Argentina somehow managed to scrape through to the Semi’s but Messi was largely a non-factor.
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While he did acknowledge that he was not performing as well as he wanted to, he shifted part of the blame on the poor conditions of the pitch in Brazil. Just to make matters worse, the best match that Messi had in the whole tournament was marred by poor refereeing. After the semi final match against Brazil, the Barcelona talisman went on an expletive rant on the sub-standard refereeing employed on the night.
On Saturday, Argentina took on Chile for the Bronze medal. Argentina came out on top thanks to goals from Sergio Aguero and Paulo Dybala. However, the tournament took its ugliest turn for their skipper as Lionel Messi was handed a red card following an incident with Chile’s Gary Medel.
Replays however showed that perhaps the referee made the decision in haste. Messi’s push and stamp on Medel warranted a Yellow card at the maximum. It just didn’t seem dangerous at all and others have gone without a card with worse. As far as the incident is concerned, Medel seemed to be the aggressor in the squabble while Messi seemed to just defend himself. And even that shouldn’t have warranted a red card.
The Incident
Now in slow motion
https://twitter.com/Smith1988John/status/1147762416949895168
Not a happy camp
The Argentinians were not happy about the incident at all. After the match, Lionel Scaloni, Argentina coach told reporters (per AS):
“I have seen the video and so far, I do not understand what he did to have been expelled. It would be interesting if the referee came out to public to speak exactly what he saw and also the men of the VAR. Obviously, he made a very quick decision, very strange, and worst of all is that the VAR does not correct, because for this there is the VAR. The VAR is here to help, and today it did not help.”
“We have already seen a few times expulsions in which the referee returns in the decision and shows the yellow card. This is what should have happened in this case. If you look properly, Messi did nothing. Well, they did not go back on the decision, they did not review it. I think the criterion is very strange. The other day Uruguay, I think it was by the nail of the foot, by the finger of Cavani pointed offside. They reviewed the video 55 times to try to justify, and with our team, everything that is against, is not reviewed.”
Messi refused his Bronze medal in the aftermath of the match and snubbed the medal ceremony at Arena Corinthians. Understandably upset, he called the competition corrupt and was very critical of the officiating in the match.
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