While Spain was up to its neck in water resolving its date with Uzbekistan, the first bizarre scene of the Games, and of football in general, was taking place in the Argentina-Morocco match played at the same time in Saint-Étienne. What seemed to have ended with a 2-2 after the Argentine equaliser in the 106th minute, it turned out that two hours later that goal was disallowed after the referee reviewed it on the VAR monitor with the stadium already empty.
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The 2011/12/13 season saw the 2012/13/14 season open for the first time in the history of football, with the 2012/13/15 season being the year of the 2012/13/16 season.
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Munir, Oussama El Azzouzi, Zakaria El Ouahdi, Mehdi Boukamir, Achraf Hakimi, Oussama Targhaline, Amir Richardson, Ilias Chakkour (Abde, min. 59), Eliesse Ben Seghir, Soufiane Rahimi and Bilal El Khannous (Benjamin Bouchouari, min. 91)
Goals 0-1 min. 47: Soufiane Rahimi. 0-2 min. 51: Soufiane Rahimi. 1-2 min. 68: Giuliano Simeone.
Referee Glenn Nyberg
Yellow cards Ilias Chakkour (min. 39), Bilal El Khannous (min. 47), Zakaria El Ouahdi (min. 61), Soufiane Rahimi (min. 69), Oussama Targhaline (min. 87), Munir (min. 88) and Marco Di Césare (min. 98)
The team coached by Javier Mascherano celebrated the equaliser 24 seconds after the 15 minutes that the referee had given for extra time had gone by. At the fourth attempt, in the midst of an Argentine attack, Cristian Medina scored and tied the score at two. Or so it seemed. At the moment of the celebration, Moroccan fans invaded the pitch, according to the newspaper Oléand in an image broadcast by Eurosport you can also see how a firecracker fell next to the Albiceleste bench.
😨 𝐃𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐛𝐢𝐨𝐬 after Argentina 🆚 Morocco
🧨 In the midst of the celebration of the albiceleste team, after achieving the 2-2 in the last gasp, a 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐝𝐨 fell from the stands very close to some players#Paris2024 pic.twitter.com/BUpujNcxr9
— Eurosport.es (@Eurosport_ES) July 24, 2024
At first, the match seemed to have ended 2-2. But no. It was only suspended by Swedish referee Glenn Nyberg, due to the incidents. The players of both teams retreated to the changing rooms. It remained for the VAR scanner to review the validity of the goal. And that happened two hours later, with the players of both teams back on the pitch and the stands of the Geoffroy-Guichard completely deserted.
𝐋𝐎 𝐍𝐔𝐍𝐂𝐀 𝐕𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐎 😳
The 3rd round of Argentina 𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗲𝘀 will be played 🆚 Morocco after the referee annulled the 2-2 that seemed definitive 😨
📺 Follow it through #E1 and Max pic.twitter.com/y72LogooeG
— Eurosport.es (@Eurosport_ES) July 24, 2024
With everyone on the pitch in silence, the team made the classic signal to go to the VAR monitor to check if everything had been correct in the equaliser or, as the game had already started to circulate, an offside had occurred. And so it was. An illegal position by Bruno Amione cancelled out Medina’s goal. The Swedish referee, as protocol dictates, announced it over the loudspeaker, although there was no one in the stands.
Three more minutes were played to put the icing on the cake of a bizarre scene caused by the incidents of the African fans, who were the absolute majority in the stands of Saint-Étienne. The Argentine press had no choice but to evoke the book The longest penalty in the worldby Osvaldo Soriano.
Messi: “Unusual”
“It was the biggest circus I have ever seen in my life,” Javier Mascherano summed up. “The match was suspended for security reasons. At no point did they tell us about the review. In fact, the official Games website put the score at 2-2. Then, when we had no news at the hour, we started to notice things. The referee never gave us any explanations,” the coach complained, who also referred to robberies at his training camp. “Yesterday they broke into our training camp to rob us. Almada was missing a watch, rings. They ask us for credentials for everything, but then these things happen. They invaded the field seven times and then threw firecrackers at us. The second or third time they have to make a decision. They told us it was over with a 2-2 draw. Not even Morocco wanted to play it,” he assured TyC Sports.
Captain Nicolás Otamendi described it as “a historic embarrassment”. “Morocco didn’t want to play and neither did we. We waited an hour and 40 minutes, but nobody said anything to us. It makes you feel helpless because it’s the Olympic Games.” Even Leo Messi spoke out about what happened: “Unbelievable,” he wrote on his social networks.
The unprecedented ending left Argentina wanting more, as they were losing 0-2 at the start of the second half after goals from Rahimi in the first half’s extra time and in the 51st minute, from a penalty. The appearance of Giuliano Simeone, the son of the Atlético coach, immediately after conceding the second goal stirred up the Albiceleste. He was the author of the 1-2 in the 68th minute. But that was as far as Mascherano’s group went. They celebrated the 2-2 and two hours later the score was 0-0 in an image that was broadcast around the world.
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