Three months after winning the
World Cup in Qatar
, Argentina will celebrate the title at home and with all the world champions with two friendlies, against Panama and Curacao, taking advantage of the first FIFA date of the year.
Captain
Lionel Messi
also has the chance to score the 800th goal of his senior career and the 100th with the light blue and white shirt.
Beyond the weak and strange occasional rivals,
until a few days ago there were no doubts about the official nature of the two friendlies
, under FIFA regulations.
However, the arrival of a Panamanian team with a majority of substitutes, an alternative coach and
the possibility of making more changes than allowed
, cast doubt on the status of a Category A International match.
There is a logical deduction: if all those who were world champions play, how can it not be official, how can Messi not be counted on a presence and possible goals, especially if he is about to score 800, among the 701 that he has in clubs and 98 in the National Team.
It is not about Argentina but about rivals and regulations.
For FIFA there are two types of official matches
, those of competition, such as World Cups, Qualifiers, Confederations and the competitions organized by their direct affiliates, that is, the confederations.
And the FIFA friendlies, which are played under its regulations.
FIFA says in the Regulations for International Matches regarding matches considered A: “
Match played by the first national teams of two member associations (national team “A”
).
In point 7 of the same, it reaffirms two concepts: “
1. In the context of these regulations, top-level international matches are understood to be those in which the two participating teams are the “A” national teams of the two member associations in liza or those in which at least one of them is a combined team.
2. FIFA, the confederations and the participating member associations will authorize top level international matches.
Annex A contains a summary of the authorizations required for an international match of this level."
That is to say,
Argentina-Panama and Argentina-Curaçao are, a priori, top-level international matches
.
Much more if all the papers are in order, the authorizations and the payment of fees corresponding to the Zurich entity.
On the other hand, if the rival is a youth (under 23) or a club, the match goes to a second or third level category, according to the request of the organizing entity of the friendly.
Training of the Panamanian national team before traveling to Argentina.
EFE / Welcome Velasco
Another issue that weighs in the international matches of Selection A is the number of changes that can be made.
In the FIFA Laws of the Game, specific, in Rule 3, the number of substitutions.
It says: “
A maximum of six substitutes may be used in A national team matches
”.
Although five modifications can now be made to official matches (transitory decision of the International Board due to the covid-19 pandemic), there is no definition after 2004, when FIFA limited the number of changes in international matches.
Against Panama and Curaçao, according to the latest information, there will be only six changes.
Everything indicates that both will be international A.
Throughout history, the National Team has played 1,028 official A matches and another 300 friendly matches that are not considered top-level.
The last one, on December 29, 2004, in Barcelona, against the Catalan National Team.
That day, the team led by José Pekerman won 3-0. It was just six months before Lionel Messi's debut in the national team, on August 17, 2005, against Hungary (2-1) in Budapest.
Since then, none of the 232 games played by Argentina, of which Messi played 172, was in doubt of being considered category A.
Lionel Scaloni, the current coach of Argentina, played the last match of the team considered second level, against Catalonia in 2004. Photo: (AP Photo_Bernat Armangue)
During the Marcelo Bielsa era, Argentina played three category B games. The first against Espanyol de Barcelona (0-2), on November 14, 1999, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Catalan club;
later, on the day of Diego Maradona's farewell, on November 10, 2001, against the Estrellas team (3-0);
and the last, before the 2002 Korea/Japan World Cup, a friendly against the Japanese club Kashima Antlers (5-1).
Argentina thrashed Kashima in 2002, with Gabriel Batistuta as the protagonist.
Photo: [AP Photo/Itsuo Inouye]
In the same way, the matches between the Rest of the World (3--0) and the Rest of the Americas (2-1), played in 1991 with Alfio Basile as coach, do not have category A. That is why the unbeaten record of the Coco had 31 international matches and not 33. Likewise, La
Scaloneta
surpassed that mark and reached 36, a streak that ended in its debut in Qatar by losing 2-1 to Saudi Arabia.
Diego Maradona has 87 A caps for the National Team
.
For a long time it was counted as 91, but a review that took place within FIFA at the beginning of the 21st century removed international category A from four games.
In two of them, Maradona scored goals and that is why there are 31 and not 33. One was on June 25, 1979, against a team called Rest of the World, to celebrate the first anniversary of the world championship, a meeting that also featured the
Clarin
organization
.
Argentina lost 2-1 and Diego scored a great goal, from his left foot, into the right corner of the goal defended by the Brazilian goalkeeper Leao.
In addition, there were
three other games against the Republic of Ireland
between 1978 and 1980, which always featured an Irish league team.
The only A game against the
Green Army
was on May 16, 1980, in Dublin, with a 1-0 win with a goal from Daniel Valencia.
Menotti's team also played matches throughout the country against selected league or club teams and on international tours faced Valencia, Fiorentina and Barcelona, among others.
With Carlos Bilardo, meanwhile, the Argentine team faced Valladolid, Napoli and Grasshopper, among others, already minor teams such as Hungary (actually Vasas) and Romania in the Nehru Cup in 1984, or the Guatemala team in 1990 In Basile's stage, only those two were mentioned.
Meanwhile, during the Daniel Passarella era there were four second level matches as the rivals were under 23 teams: Romania (1-0), Slovakia (6-0, 2 goals by Gabriel Batistuta), Poland (2-0) and Romania (2-1).
The most emblematic unofficial match in history continues to be the 3-1 win against England
on May 14, 1953. The match was put together at the last minute due to the great expectation generated by the visit of the English national team whose official date was the 17th. , three days later.
The first meeting at the Monumental (the unofficial one) was attended by
more than 86 thousand people
, since 85,483 general tickets were sold, plus 1065 popular invitations and 849 stalls.
The English did not wear their official coat.
Finally,
on Sunday the 17th, the game scheduled and authorized by the FA and FIFA was played.
.
There were almost 100,000 spectators and it was suspended after 23 minutes of the first half due to rain.
The first years, the 3-1 did not appear in the official programs that the AFA prepared for international matches.
English books do not even record it
.
In the official program of Argentina-Italy, from 1956, the 3-1 victory over England does not appear.
For the AFA administration it was not the official either.
In the 21st century, there are many more institutional channels to find out and determine if a match meets all the requirements to be considered a FIFA National A friendly. Although doubts always hover, sometimes due to lack of communication.
It is to be hoped that everything will be transparent in the matches on Thursday against Panama and on Tuesday against Curaçao.
And if he scores goals,
let there be no questioning about Messi's 800th goal
in his career or 100th in the National Team.
What is certain, beyond these details, that it will be a party for the people and the protagonists who achieved the third star.