After a deadlocked and disappointing performance against Iceland, Argentine fans are looking forward to another face of their team when entering the second match against Croatia.
Coach Jorge Sampaoli was very determined in eliminating bad players in the opening match such as Angel di Maria, Marcos Rojo, Lucas Biglia to create novelty as well as carry out the task of attacking. But all the changes of Sampaoli are like "new gifts, old wine". The 4-man midfield lacked the connection to create balls that could penetrate the Croatian defense. The illusion is the accurate depiction of La Albiceleste's playing style. Argentina's 3 goals conceded came as a matter of course.
After this defeat, fans suddenly shared photos of a strange action of Messi at the flag-raising ceremony of the two teams. When the camera approached Messi, he used his hands to cover his face, on his face he clearly showed fatigue and helplessness. That action will not be noticed if Argentina wins against Croatia. However, the humiliating defeat of the defending runner-up caused fans to quickly hand over Messi's image as a premise for the failure of the Tango dancers.
"Messi already knows the result", or "Messi already knows caballero will cause disaster" are the thoughts of fans when seeing a photo of Messi hugging his face while singing the Argentine national anthem before the match.
Compared with Argentina's 0-3 loss, this photo is even more "expected". And so fans had the opportunity to share the photo and comments like "salting salt" on the hearts of Messi and the Argentina team.
Caballero, the goalkeeper next to Messi at the beginning of the match, made a silly mistake, helping Croatia open the scoring. Then Argentina flooded up to attack and lost 2 more goals from counter-attacks.
Therefore, Messi's face-close approach before the match was understood as having experienced some bad things afterwards. Of course, this is just a coincidence. But it became a hot topic on social media, after Argentina's shocking defeat. Messi himself was also criticized for not singing the national anthem before the match. M10 carried the captain's armband but played lacklusterly, taking responsibility for the team's loss.
