Veteran status shouldn't save Mascherano after woeful performance
Welcome to modern-day Argentina, a madcap purveyor of peaks, troughs, and calamity. La Albiceleste is safe, just, through a tournament-saving 2-1 win over Nigeria in St. Petersburg, but the match may have featured the slow death of an international career.
"We talked about football to help us. The best technicians ask the players for advice too because we decide on the field," Mascherano said late last week when quizzed on an apparent rift with lambasted manager Jorge Sampaoli and a rumoured interference in the tattooed tactician's designs.
If Mascherano did have a say in the approach for the St. Petersburg tussle, he may have unwittingly arranged his own downfall.
The blueprint was simplified and relied on familiarity in personnel and system.
A 3-4-2-1 formation that exposed Willy Caballero and the Argentinian defence's ineptitude in possession, and how Mascherano and Enzo Perez (who wasn't even in the original 23-man squad) can't adequately protect a short-handed and slow backline, was dispensed with. A 4-2-3-1 schematic that has been globally popular for around a decade was ushered in, and with its implementation, the expanses of green grass that were exploited by Croatia's Luka Modric and Ivan Rakitic were tightened. Confidence was bred by the players actually knowing their roles.
Mascherano certainly had the team's best interests at heart if the plans were his own. He was a disaster, practically singling himself out as a man who cannot compete at the highest level anymore; as a man who is now losing matches to Shandong Luneng and Henan Jianye in the Chinese Super League.
The 34-year-old let football happen around him, and when a teammate trusted him with the ball - there were occasions when Lionel Messi appeared to turn into trouble or pick a tougher pass, rather than play it to his former Barcelona colleague - he continually hindered Argentina's play. Ahmed Musa was too slippery for him on two occasions but failed to punish Mascherano's disintegrating athleticism when he missed the target as he struggled for balance, and when his cutback couldn't find Odion Ighalo.
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There were also a few loose passes from the San Lorenzo native, with one anxious surrendering of possession sending Kelechi Iheanacho through on goal. Mascherano managed to atone for his error by catching up to the Leicester City man's ponderous venture upfield, but he had already cast himself as a glaring weakness in Argentina's lineup.
His most shameful flashpoint occurred when he conceded the penalty for Nigeria's equaliser. Oghenekaro Etebo smashed his corner in the direction of the six-yard box, and it may have sailed over the head of Leon Balogun at the near post. However, Mascherano made sure of that. Following what may have been a crackdown in penalty-box grappling after Harry Kane and Aleksandar Mitrovic weren't awarded spot kicks against Tunisia and Switzerland, respectively, Mascherano put both hands around Balogun, giving the Brighton & Hove Albion new boy an easy excuse to go down. A second look at VAR confirmed that it was a penalty, and Victor Moses confidently finished from 12 yards to level after Messi's heroic opener.
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During the second half, as Sampaoli made three panicky substitutions, Mascherano was eventually tasked with being the last man in defence. It was damage limitation, a task often left to the portly bloke with a bad back on the pub team, who also happens to be the establishment's landlord. It felt sympathetic, or as if Sampaoli was appeasing the man who is really in charge at Argentina's Bronnitsy camp.
La Albiceleste barely survived the group stage through an 86th-minute hit from Marcos Rojo, and there are several issues throughout this unbalanced and aged Argentinian throng. But, judging from the tournament thus far, Mascherano is the most problematic. In the round of 16, France's rapid wingers and Paul Pogba sliding higher up the park could eviscerate him.