Written by Andrew Keh at LA Times.com
Lionel Messi had the collar of his shirt pulled up to his nose. With his eyes peeking out just over the fabric, he watched a nightmare unfold.
Argentina and Chile had played 120 minutes of ruthless, scoreless soccer on Sunday night at MetLife Stadium. Penalty kicks would be needed to decide the winner of the 45th Copa América. Up stepped Messi, widely regarded as the best player in the world, to take the first shot for Argentina, and he missed, sending the ball sailing over the crossbar and into the crowd. Moments later, he watched as Francisco Silva of Chile buried a shot inside the left post to give his team a 4-2 shootout win.
All of the Argentine players hung their heads near the center circle as the Chileans erupted in celebration. But Messi took a slow, solitary walk across the grass and took a seat on the far end of his team’s bench. He stared at the grass as the Chilean players bobbed up and down in celebration. When he got up again, there were tears in his eyes.
The emotions boiled over, and they carried to the locker room. When Messi, 29, re-emerged, he suggested, shockingly, that his national team career was over.
“In the locker room, I thought that the national team was finished for me, that it’s not for me,” Messi said. “It’s what I feel right now. It’s a great sadness that it happened to me, that I missed penalty kick that was very important. It’s for the good of everybody. It’s not enough to just get to the final and not win.”
The meeting of Argentina and Chile in the 45th Copa América final was eagerly awaited as an alluring confrontation of two of the finest soccer teams in the world. Yet the game that materialized had all the charm and beauty of a street brawl.
Faces puckered in pain and anger. Studded cleats whipped dangerously in the air, aimed at flesh. Bodies collided with other bodies, crumpling and splaying onto the grass.
Those in the crowd of 82,026 — the largest soccer crowd in New Jersey history — who sought a showcase of sophisticated play were instead treated to a stream of crunching tackles, theatrical quarrels, disciplinary cards (eight yellows, two reds).
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