After the Third place play-off on 6 July 2019 of 2019 Copa America, Argentina secured the third place against Chile 2–1 at Arena Corinthians, São Paulo.
Argentina who earlier after defeating Venezuela by 2-0 made their entry to semi-finals and all thanks to the stronger presence up front who made the win possible. On the other hand, in semi-finals round, Argentina got defeated by Brazil 2-0 on July 2 and ended up in the Third place play-off, whereas Brazil qualified for the 2019 Copa America Finals where they will face Peru on the other side on the finale.
Chile, on the other hand, who were the two-time defending champions, having won the 2015 and 2016 editions lost their semi-final match against Peru with 3-0 scores.
At that time, Chile coach Reinaldo Rueda on their big loss said, “We entered the match already thinking about the final and that’s how we allowed Peru to surprise us,”
He further added, “We didn’t show the attitude and aggressiveness from the previous matches.”
Coming back to Third place play-off match, Sergio Aguero and Paulo Dybala were the star performers from Argentina side who took an early lead and won the match. But that was not only the thing that made that night notable, that eventful consolation playoff also saw Lionel Messi sent off for just the second time in his career.
Messi’s red card stole all the headlines after a clash with Gary Medel who is Chile defender just before half-time.
The big talk undoubtedly right now is sending off of Medel and Messi – who has never been sent off for Barcelona, and whose only other red card was on his international first appearance that was held 14 years ago.
The exclusion marked the first time that the Barcelona forward had been sent off in a senior game for club or the country from the time of his first appearance with the national team in the year 2005.
Tempers dropped over eight minutes earlier half time when Messi appeared to nudge over Medel as they together challenged for the ball.
Medel responded by force and pushing his face into Messi’s as the two players argued before the referee reached, showed them red card and dismissed both of them from the match.
It appeared harsh on Messi, who in the replays of the occurrence did not seems to respond violently to Medel’s act.
In the meantime, the 2019 Copa America is all set to start final play- off between Brazil and Peru. Both the teams are ready for this big match which will decide the ultimate winner of 2019 Copa America and who is going to take the title trophy to their homeland. Both the teams have to give their best shot in their next and final match as it is the final round on July 7 at Estádio do Maracanã, Rio de Janeiro.
“We knew that it would be difficult because of the players they have,” said Brazil’s Casemiro after winning the semi- final match against Argentina. “It’s about details. We knew it would be scrappy and that there would be wind-ups and time wasting. But we have to congratulate our strikers who did a great job. When they got chances, they scored.”
Peru striker Paolo Guerrero after winning semi-final match against Chile said, “When this team wants something, it works hard and gets it. We deserved to make it to the final. We were fully focused from the start.”
“I think we all played well, we all made sacrifices,” Guerrero further said. “We were very intense and we deserve to be in the final. Now we need to rest and think of Brazil. It’ll be a very hard final.”
