\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\t Argentina men\u2019s national football team head coach Lionel Scaloni said \u201cplaying with your heart makes up for a lot of things\u201d, after the Albiceleste had to fight tooth and nail against Cape Verde for its ticket to the Round of 16.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe knew it was going to be a tough match,\u201d said Scaloni. \u201cDespite how much we suffered for it, we deserved the win, but they made things hard for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Argentina head coach highlighted the team\u2019s never-say-never attitude, and how it \u201cnever shrank away\u201d in the game. He insisted the Albiceleste \u201cshowed its character\u201d while acknowledging that he\u2019ll have to work with the team on the things that went wrong.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe rose to the challenge in this match, which many thought was going to be a walk in the park, but we knew it wouldn\u2019t,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Scaloni said that Cape Verde is a \u201cgreat team\u201d and that the effort they put into the duel with Argentina can \u201covercome a lot of factors\u201d in today\u2019s game, particularly as it went into extra time.<\/p>\n
The Argentina boss said his team \u201chardly ever feels the weight of being the favorites,\u201d and will never \u201cshy away\u201d from the game. However, he insisted he \u201cnever felt like the job was done,\u201d as that\u2019s what his experience has taught him.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe match got ugly for us,\u201d he admitted, \u201cand it could\u2019ve gone either way.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was Scaloni\u2019s 100th game at the helm of the national team, and he was adamant this was one which \u201cwill leave a mark\u201d with him, saying he was thankful it was a win, \u201celse it would\u2019ve been a sad statistic.\u201d<\/p>\n
The game against Cape Verde drew comparisons to Argentina\u2019s Qatar 2022 opener against Saudi Arabia, in which Argentina took the lead before losing 2-1 in similar circumstances.<\/p>\n
Scaloni agreed with the comparison, but insisted experience made the difference in this one.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe team reacted this time around,\u201d he pointed out. \u201cThey know what it is to play a World Cup, and the team was always in the match.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked to send a message to the fans watching from Argentina, Scaloni highlighted the team\u2019s courage once again.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I sit here and say the Argentina jersey isn\u2019t the same as the others, people say we\u2019re arrogant, but I can\u2019t guarantee it is,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen you\u2019re down in the match, and you have 70,000 fans in the stands and 47 million following you, it takes guts, and this team has them.<\/p>\n
Cover image: Selecci\u00f3n Argentina Twitter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Argentina men\u2019s national football team head coach Lionel Scaloni said \u201cplaying with your heart makes up for a lot of things\u201d, after the Albiceleste had to fight tooth and nail against Cape Verde for its ticket to the Round of 16. \u201cWe knew it was going to be a tough match,\u201d said Scaloni. \u201cDespite how […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":85807,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5063,66,5309,67],"tags":[5307,1368,5308,1369],"class_list":["post-85806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-2026-world-cup","category-football","category-lionel-scaloni","category-sports","tag-2026-world-cup","tag-football","tag-lionel-scaloni","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85806"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85806\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}