Prattlegonia.

Oh, hello there, Angel Di Maria.  I've caught you looking silly and long-faced.  How unsurprising.

In the late September of 2007, I went to Argentina.  I was in Buenos Aires for seven or eight days (memory fails me),  and it was AWESOME.  Shit was cheap, I was there to play soccer, and the food was insanely good.  Highlight of the trip?  Eating a 1000 gram steak.  You do the unit conversion; I pooped happiness for days.

Given the opportunity, I would definitely like to go back.  Everything about the country appeals to me.  Except.

WHY I HATE YOUR TEAM - ARGENTINA EDITION



Dear Argentina-

For a long time, when pressed to describe Argentina in terms of world soccer, I would call you The Italy of South America.  Older and wiser, I now know this is a poor comparison.  Kind of.

The reason I threw the label on you in the first place was your proclivity for diving, along with your being the South American country with the most phenotypical European influence.  Honestly, I still make mistakes when I try and guess if a player is Italian or Tino.  It took me three years to figure out that Alberto Aquilani never played for Independiente, let alone lived in Argentina.

Diving and my racism aside, there really aren't very many similarities between your styles of footballing, which is where the comparison ends.  The Argentine game is an open, attack oriented affair that's actually fairly attractive.  Your six goal stomping of the now defunct Serbia-Montenegro team in 2006 was delightful (if you're not Nemanja Vidic).

But you're still a bunch of divers, Argentina, and I hate you for it.  Unfortunately, I can't really find any concrete YouTube examples to share with the rest of the class, but that doesn't mean it's slander.  It's something I've known to be true since childhood, like "the Northern Lights are sweet" and "I love steak."  I really love steak.

Caveat:  Lionel Messi (pictured with BFF and coach Diego Maradona) is not a diver.  He plays like a man.  A tiny, tiny man who just happens to be the best player in the world right now.  Unfortunately, you've found other ways to corrupt him.

Coming off an insane year (despite not winning six trophies) with Barcelona, the general consensus is that, as a footballer, Leo Messi falls somewhere on the following spectrum:

[--GODLY----------GOD-LIKE----------GOD--]

We'll see how long that consensus lasts.  Argentina, I hate you because you make Messi seem like an average player.  In the great modern debate of Cristiano Ronaldo vs. Lionel Messi, CRonaldo supporters always point to Messi's poor international form as the reason he should lose out to the Portuguese Fuckface.  While some of this criticism is largely anecdotal ( a strike rate of 14 goals over 44 appearances isn't bad), some of it is worryingly true.

I don't know what it is you do to Messi, but it's not good, Argentina.  In his debut for the senior team, he was almost immediately sent off for headbutting a defender.  He just doesn't have the same impact on games when he dons the blue and white as when he plays for Barcelona.  It's a rather mystical lack of form, no one, not even the man himself can figure out what's going on.

His lack of form only occurs when he plays for Argentina, so it's obviously your fault.  If making the best player in the world's game ugly isn't reason for hate, I don't know what is.

Next Topic:  Maradona is CRAZY.  More on this in tomorrow's edition of Nemeses.

Next-er Topic:  In this week's edition of The Emasculation Report, this just in:  Carlos Tevez makes me wonder if I actually have a penis.  No, seriously.  That guy is the definition of a man, man, man.

1)  He never stops running.  Ever.
2)  He's roughly 2'4", but will throw anyone off the ball.
3)  He refused an offer to have his facial/neck scars removed.
4)  You know the training scene from Rocky IV where Stallone works out in a barn with a horse cart, saws a bunch of wood, and runs in boots up a mountain?  That's how Carlos Tevez lives his life.  Except he also eats rocks.



You know in the offseason, he's just chilling up in Patagonia, chomping boulders and running uphill into avalanches.  And that severely cramps my self-image.  Dick.

I hate some of your other players for much more arbitrary, much less personal reasons.

Juan Sebastian Veron is another soccer player that's gotta be some sort of Super-Villain.  Look at the man.  He commutes to work in a stolen nuclear submarine.  He plays for Argentina, but is originally from a secret country like Latveria.  He calls all his teammates henchmen.  Maybe it's easy for me to make these assumptions because he looks like a young Ben Kingsley, but whatever it is, I would not  leave a baby within a thousand feet of that guy.  Well, maybe Baby aka Birdman from the Ca$h Money clique.  He can probably handle his biz.

Martin Palermo just looks silly.  I know it's a rather dismissive analysis, but it's all I've got to offer.  Every time I see that guy, I think "Wow.  That's apparently an adult, but I'm not buying it.

I feel like this hate-letter is incomplete.  Remind me to tell you the story about Bears, Butterflies and Homophobia some time.  For now, this will have to do.

Argentina.  Te odio.

-ZGS

PS:  Ronaldo Report - Indian buffet, a brownie and a coke.