I knew Argentina had truly arrived when football fans stopped talking about Lionel Messi and started talking about referees.
For years, the football world wanted Argentina to win.
More accurately, it wanted Messi to win.
That distinction matters.
For almost two decades, Messi was football’s tragic hero. He dazzled Barcelona fans every week, won every trophy imaginable and rewrote record books, yet one criticism followed him everywhere: he had never won a World Cup with Argentina.
Every defeat only strengthened the myth.
When Argentina lost the 2014 World Cup final to Germany, neutrals sympathised with Messi. When they lost back-to-back Copa America finals in 2015 and 2016, that sympathy only grew. When Messi briefly retired from international football after the second defeat, even rival fans pleaded with him to return.
The world loved Messi because he seemed cursed. The world loved Argentina because they appeared destined to stumble at the final hurdle.
Then Argentina started winning.
The Copa America arrived in 2021. The Finalissima followed in 2022. Then came Qatar and the World Cup trophy millions had longed to see Messi lift.
The fairytale was complete.
And that was precisely when the mood began to change.
FROM HEROES TO VILLAINS
Football loves redemption stories.
What it struggles to embrace is sustained success.
The evidence is everywhere.
The same fans who spent years mocking Argentina for losing finals now complain that they win too much. The same people who desperately wanted Messi to complete football now seem equally desperate for Argentina to be eliminated.
Somewhere along the way, Argentina transformed from football’s favourite underdogs into football’s favourite villains.
The funny thing is that very little actually changed.
The players are still immensely talented. The supporters are still passionate. Their football remains emotional, chaotic and endlessly dramatic.
What changed was the trophy cabinet.
Ever since Qatar, almost every major Argentina victory has come with an asterisk from critics.
The World Cup itself remains the clearest example.
Argentina won seven matches in Qatar. They comfortably dispatched Croatia in the semi-finals before defeating France in one of the greatest World Cup finals ever played.
Yet an astonishing number of football fans emerged from the tournament convinced that the competition had somehow been designed to help Messi win.
The penalties awarded to Argentina became a global obsession. Social media filled with “Pessi” jokes. Every refereeing decision was examined frame by frame. Every VAR intervention became fresh evidence for a grand conspiracy.
The strange part was that Argentina were hardly the first team to benefit from penalties at a major tournament.
Nor were they the first champions to receive favourable decisions.
Football history is littered with controversial moments. England’s 1966 triumph is still debated because of Geoff Hurst’s famous ‘Wembley Goal’, with many insisting the ball never fully crossed the line. Argentina supporters still feel aggrieved by the penalty awarded to West Germany in the 1990 World Cup final and the dismissal of Pedro Monzon, decisions many believe shaped the outcome. Spain, France, Germany and Italy all have controversial moments attached to major tournament victories.
Yet somehow, Argentina’s achievements are treated as uniquely suspicious.
It often feels as though many people had already reached the conclusion and were simply searching for evidence to support it.
WHY ARGENTINA DIVIDE OPINION
No footballer illustrates this better than Emiliano Martinez.
Martinez is provocative. He talks. He taunts. He celebrates. He embraces the role of football’s villain.
Yet the sport has spent decades celebrating larger-than-life personalities.
Eric Cantona became an icon. Jose Mourinho built an entire career on mind games. Zlatan Ibrahimovic transformed supreme confidence into an art form.
Martinez, however, often attracts outrage that feels wildly disproportionate.
For some reason, when others do it, it is called charisma.
When an Argentine does it, it becomes controversy.
The same pattern appears repeatedly.
Argentina’s passion becomes aggression. Their confidence becomes arrogance. Their gamesmanship becomes a moral crisis.
Meanwhile, similar behaviour from other footballing powers is routinely dismissed as part of elite sport.
None of this is to suggest Argentina are beyond criticism.
Far from it.
The ugly fallout from the 2024 Copa America celebrations deserved every bit of scrutiny it received. Several Argentina players, including Enzo Fernandez, were filmed singing a chant that French players and the French Football Federation condemned as racist and discriminatory. The controversy rightly sparked widespread outrage and prompted investigations.
Criticism in that instance was not only justified but necessary.
There is, however, an important distinction between holding individuals accountable for a specific incident and using that episode to define an entire football team, fanbase or footballing culture.
THE PRICE OF BEING CHAMPIONS
Perhaps the greatest irony is that football fans spent years asking for exactly this version of Argentina.
They wanted Messi to win.
They wanted Argentina back among football’s elite.
They wanted South American football to challenge Europe’s dominance once again.
Well, they got exactly what they wished for.
Argentina are world champions. They have reclaimed their place among football’s dominant powers. Every tournament now begins with Argentina firmly among the favourites.
And suddenly, many people seem uncomfortable with that reality.
Perhaps it is because Argentina keep ruining everyone else’s story.
England want to end decades of heartbreak. France want another golden generation. Spain want to build a new dynasty.
Standing in front of each of those dreams is Argentina.
Champions inevitably become obstacles rather than dreamers.
Football almost always prefers dreamers.
That is why the hostility no longer bothers me, an unrepentant Argentina fan, as much as it once did.
Nobody spends hours discussing a team they do not fear.
Nobody invents conspiracy theories about a team they expect to lose.
Nobody passionately roots against a side unless they believe it has a genuine chance of lifting the trophy.
The memes, the accusations, the refereeing debates and the endless online outrage are not signs of irrelevance.
They are signs of importance.
For years, Argentina were football’s tragic romantics.
Now they are champions.
The world loved Argentina when they were suffering. It celebrated when Messi finally reached the summit.
But staying there is a very different challenge.
The romance ends.
The resentment begins.
That has always been the price of becoming champions.
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