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Argentinian legend Lionel Messi is the people’s champion but the superstar has had his nose out of joint after his nation’s shootout win over the Netherlands on Saturday morning (Australian time).
Messi’s Argentina is through to the World Cup semi-finals and will face Croatia for a place in the decider after a pair of tense shootouts.
Messi is known as a fairly cool customer and lives as private a life as a man with 386 million Instagram followers, arguably one of the greatest players to ever live and a billionaire can live.
But he was far from thrilled after his side survived through to the penultimate match of the World Cup after a 2-all draw ended in a 4-3 shootout win.
However, Messi was furious after his side led 2-0 until seven minutes from time when Wout Weghorst scored his first, before adding a second in the eleventh minute of injury time to force extra-time.
The World Cup is one of the only titles Messi hasn’t claimed in his remarkable career but the win over the Netherlands was as spiteful as it gets.
There were 15 cards in the game, eight for Argentina, six yellows and a red for the Dutch. But there were also some cards flashed in the direction of the benches throughout the match.
After the game, the teams came together once again.
Safe to say, there’ll be no Christmas cards between the teams this year.
But while Messi was talking to Argentinian media on field after the game, a rival believed to be Weghorst, who reportedly wanted to shake hands and swap jerseys, was brutally rejected by Messi.
“What you looking at, idiot? Go on, f**k off over there” he yelled at a player identified as Weghorst before the presenter tried to give Messi the chance to calm down.
Weghorst later said: “I went to shake his hand after the game. He has not accepted it and has said something rude to me, but I do not understand Spanish very well. I’m very disappointed.”
Messi raged at the Dutch coach as well, claiming disrespect from Louis van Gaal.
He let Van Gaal know as well, giving him and Dutch assistant Edgar Davids both barrels as he left the ground.
“I feel disrespected by Van Gaal after his pregame comments and some Dutch players spoke too much during the game,” Messi told reporters.
“Van Gaal tells that he plays good football and then he puts forwards in the box and starts throwing long balls.”
The Dutch weren’t the only ones on the Messi hit list either as he blasted referee Antonio Mateu.
“After they got the draw I felt a lot of anger,” he said.
“I don’t want to talk about the referee, because they immediately reprimand you or sanction you, but I think people saw what happened.
“FIFA has to review that, it can’t give a referee like that a match of this importance when they’re not up to the task.
“We didn’t have a great game, and then the referee sent it to extra time. He was always against us. In the last play (from which the Dutch scored), it was not a foul.”
Messi was not alone in his fury as his teammates gave the Dutch a serve after the match.
Argentinian and Aston Villa goalie Emi Martinez blasted Van Gaal, shouting: “I f**ked you twice, you b***h,” after two big saves and “Keep your mouth shut f**king t**t” to the Dutch bench.
He added in the press conference: “I heard van Gaal saying they had an advantage in penalties and that he thought if it went to penalties, they’d win. I think he needs to keep his mouth shut.”
He also blasted the referee, calling him “the worst referee in the tournament”.
“The ref was giving everything for them. They got a good header, a good flick, I couldn’t see it and all of a sudden it turned upside down. The ref was giving everything for them,” he said.
“He gave ten minutes (added time) for no reason. He gave a free kick outside the box for them for no reason two or three times. He wanted them to score, that’s basically it. Hopefully we don’t have that ref anymore because he’s useless.”
