With the presence of Lionel Messi, the Argentine coach Lionel Scaloni released this Thursday the list with the 28 summoned for the last two friendlies prior to the Qatar 2022 World Cup, which will be on September 23 against Honduras and on September 27 against Jamaica, both in USA. Among the new names are Enzo Fernández, Thiago Almada and Facundo Medina.
With a high level at the start of the season, Messi heads a list that could be very close to the list that will face the competition in November. The biggest news is the absence of midfielder Exequiel Palacios, from Bayer Leverkusen, who left last weekend with a muscle problem from the match against Hertha Berlin, and striker Nicolás González, from Fiorentina, who also suffers from an injury. Other unaffected were goalkeeper Juan Musso, from Atalanta, and defender Lucas Martínez Quarta, from Fiorentina, although in these cases his absences are due to football reasons.
Among the additions of players who are not the usual ones, midfielder Enzo Fernández is not surprising, who arrived at Benfica and had an excellent start to the season, with a rapid adaptation to high-level European football, between the Portuguese League and the Champions League. There is also Thiago Almada, currently at Atlanta United in the United States after being a figure for Vélez at just 19 years old, as a result of his positive season, although at first it seems more like a bet and a conditioning for the future in the National Team than a piece for Qatar. The former Vélez has six goals in the United States MLS championship, three of them in the last month, and six assists – the team’s top assister.
Another name that, although it was part of the process at some point, reappeared is that of Facundo Medina, a member of the under-23 at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, and with an interesting present in defense of France’s Lens (28 games in the year). Although like Almada, his seems more to the future than to the immediate present.
Undoubtedly, the possibility of taking 26 professionals to the World Cup, instead of the classic 23 that were enabled until Russia 2018, is a relief for Lionel Scaloni, who now looks with hope at the rebirth of Paulo Dybala from Cordoba in Rome, as a leader within of the field of the Portuguese team José Mourinho, or the arrival of Julián Álvarez to the ‘City’ of the Spanish Josep Guardiola, who seems in love with the former River attacker.
In the arc, the fight seems to be more and more defined, with Emiliano “Dibu” Martínez as the undisputed starter and followed behind by Franco Armani and Gerónimo Rulli, a key man at Villarreal in Spain. It seems the same in the defensive line, beyond the calls to Nehuén Pérez and Facundo Medina, and the doubt now arises in the middle with the level shown by Enzo Fernández in the second half.
Argentina will face these two friendlies on September 23 against Honduras and on September 27 against Jamaica, both in the United States, and will have its last presentation days before the debut against the United Arab Emirates (11/16), by Argentine Rodolfo Arruabarrena. In the World Cup, Argentina will share group C with Poland, Mexico and Saudi Arabia, rival from the start on Tuesday, November 22, at 7 (Argentine time), at the stadium in Lusail.