The famous Argentine superstar lifted football’s most prestigious trophy in December 2022 after Argentina’s impressive performance throughout the tournament. Messi shines on the field with impressive performances but has also been embroiled in some controversies along the way.

In the quarter-final match against the Netherlands, Argentina won on penalties after a 2-2 draw in official time. Messi was shocked when celebrating the goal by irritating the opposing coach. After scoring in the match, Messi ran towards the Dutch bench, cupped both hands around his ears, facing them – this made the coaching staff and the Orange players feel uncomfortable.

Now, it has been confirmed that Messi performed this celebration as a tribute to sports hero Juan Roman Riquelme – who famously fell out with coach Van Gaal while at Barcelona.

In the Netflix show ‘Captains of the World’, journalist Julien Laurens commented: “Van Gaal almost ruined the career of Messi’s idol, Juan Roman Riquelme.

“The Dutch coach refused to let the Argentinian player play at Barcelona. When Riquelme scores for Barcelona, ​​he does his trademark celebration with Van Gaal.

‘Messi never forgets this.’

The Argentina captain later revealed he had been in constant contact with his idol throughout the tournament in Qatar. In the Netflix documentary, Messi said: “For many years, I spoke with Roman. And during the World Cup, we talked after the matches.

After the final whistle of the match, Van Gaal and Messi were spotted having a tense exchange, in which the Argentine player told the coach: ‘You talk too much’.

After the match, he also told reporters: “I felt Van Gaal showed a lack of respect through his comments before the match and some Dutch players talked too much during the match.”

However, a month after the World Cup, Messi admitted that he had some regrets about his actions.

“The truth is, I never thought about that kind of celebration,” he told Argentine journalist Andy Kuznetsoff. He’s on the field now and yes, he knows what he commented before the game.

“Some of my associates said ‘you saw what he said’ on purpose. We were 2-0 up and I acted… Now, I don’t like what I did, what happened after…”

“Those were extremely tense, nervous moments, everything happened very quickly and you didn’t have time to think about anything. Actually, there was no plan at all, everything happened naturally and like I said, I don’t like that image.”