Tomorrow the 43rd edition of the Copa America begins. It is the oldest tournament of national teams in the world. The first game will be Argentina against Bolivia. The game will be held at the stadium Unico in the city of La Plata, at 9:45pm (local), with referee Roberto Silvera (FIFA-URU).
The national team-which is led by Sergio 'Checho' Batista-begins their journey with the goal of winning, for the first time in 18 years, while Bolivia is now ready to play and would be satisfied to reach the second round, something that has not happened since 1997, when the team reached the final and lost to Brazil in Bolivia.
The Argentine motivation for this game, in particular, is to avenge the 6-1 thrashing they suffered from the Bolivians in La Paz, during the South American qualifiers for the World Cup in South Africa-2010.
Batista has put together a very strong offense which will comprise of Messi as the brain of the attack, Ezequiel Lavezzi (Napoli, Italy) and Carlos Tevez (Manchester City, England) who is the top scorer in the Premier League. Ever Banega (Valencia, Spain) will join the attack as a midfielder.
Messi is considered the best player in the world and maybe one of the greatest of all time. He feels that he has not proven himself as he did in Barcelona but he expects to shine on Friday.
"I was always asked why things happen the way they do on the national team. Argentina unfortunately did not win either the Copa America or the World Cup," admitted the 24 year old player, Messi last week.
Argentina is good on the offence but their weakest point is their defence.
Batista, once again, will use the 37 year old veteran Javier Zanetti (Inter, Italy), to cover the right side, and he believes in Marcos Rojo (Spartak, Russia) who plays on the left. In the back four players need to be selected and the confirmed defenders are Nicolas Burdisso (Roma, Italy) and Gabriel Milito (Barcelona, Spain).
Probable lineups of the teams are below:
Argentina: 18-Sergio Romero, 8-Javier Zanetti, 4-Nicolas Burdisso, 6-Gabriel Milito, 17-Marcos Rojo, 14-Javier Mascherano, 5-Esteban Cambiasso, 19-Ever Banega, 11-Carlos Tevez ,21-Ezekiel 10-Lavezzi and Lionel Messi. Coach: Sergio Batista.
Bolivia: 1-Carlos Arias, 4-Lorgio Alvarez, 16-Ronald Raldes, 5-Ronald Rivero, 3-Luis Gutierrez, 6-Walter Flores, 15-Jaime Robles, 21-Jhasmany Campos, 10-Joselito Vaca, 9-Marcelo and 7-Edivaldo Moreno Rojas. Coach: Gustavo Quinteros.
The stars of the game:
Argentina: There is a large possibility that the best player in the world award will be won by someone from the Argentine team. Messi, the Barcelona-SPA star won last year, and many fans hope he will win again. Another possible contender is Carlos Tevez, who has great suppot from Argentine fans. Lavezzi, Zanetti, Cambiasso and Mascherano are also greatplayers who allow the Argentine team to shine.
Bolivia: On the Bolivian side, all eyes are on Marcelo Moreno. The 24 year old striker is the player who has scored the most goals out of all those selected to play in the Copa America. His record is eight goals. The team also believes that Ronald Raldes is a star player; he plays as a defender, is 30 years old and among those selected has the most experience on the Bolivian team, this is also his fourth Copa America. (He played in 2001, 2004 and 2007).
Curiosities of the game:
- The teams have played 30 games. Argentina has 22 wins and Bolivia has 6 wins and 2 draws. Argentina has scored 78 goals and Bolivia scored 29 goals.
- In previous Copa Americas these teams played each other 13 times. Argentina won 10 times and Bolivia won twice and had one draw. Argentina scored 42 goals and Bolivia scored 10.
- Bolivia’s only two victories were at home. The first was in 1963, 3-2, and the second in 1979, 2-1.
- The Argentinian Mendez was the top scorer in the Copa America against Bolivia with four goals. He scored two goals in the victory by 7-1 in 1946, and made the other two winning for 7-0 in 1947.
- The victory in 1947 was the biggest recorded victory for Argentina.
- The biggest win for Bolivia was 6-1 against Argentina in 2009, in La Paz during the 2010 World Cup Qualifiers.
- It is expected that there will be a lot of goals in tomorrow’s game, because in the 30 games played by these teams 0-0 only occurred once, in the Copa America of 1987.
- Argentinean Javier Zanetti is the player who has participated most in Copa America tournaments, this will be his fifth.
- Ronald Raldes is the player who has participated most in previous Copa America tournaments for Bolivia, this will be his fourth.
- The referee of this match will be the Uruguayan Roberto Silvera, who was the referee in the last game between the two teams, and this will be his fourth official game.
The last face off:
In the last face off, Bolivia slaughtered Argentina. The 6-1 victory occurred in La Paz, Bolivia, during the 2010 World Cup Qualifiers. This victory was the Bolivia's greatest victory in its history over Argentina. The goals were scored by Joaquin Botero who scored 3, Marcelo Moreno, Alex da Rosa and Didi Torrico. Lucho Gonzalez scored for Argentina.
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