SerpApi.Org
The six-week World Cup produced dozens of heroes, including a 40-year-old goalkeeper, a ponytailed Viking, and a trash-talking Mexican coach. But as the tournament reached its conclusion on Sunday evening, the soccer universe came to a rare consensus.
There was only one villain—and he played for Argentina.
In the space of a single week, midfielder Enzo Fernandez managed the exceptional feat of all at once alienating millions of people from around the globe, including his own nation. He doomed his team by being sent off in the World Cup final. He enraged his club by looking to leave. And, most damning of all, he disappointed Lionel Messi.
“Wearing my country’s jersey is the greatest honor of my career,” he wrote on social media by way of an apology. “And I will continue to give my all every time I get to defend it.”
First, became an enemy of the British crown by eliminating England in the semifinals, having already fallen out with his London-based club, Chelsea. Four days later, he sent Argentina barreling toward defeat in the World Cup final against Spain by being ejected moments before extra time. All of which has turned the 25-year-old into soccer’s human piñata and left him without many places to turn heading into next season.
Newspapers in Argentina panned his performance. One newspaper in England dubbed him “a World Cup brat.” And online, fans began circulating a photo of his hands-cupping-ears, let-me-hear-you celebration with his face replaced by Margaret Thatcher’s.
“He’s cost his country massively,” former England captain Alan Shearer said on ‘The Rest is Football.’ “As much as he helped get them through to the final with that wonderful goal against England, he’s cost his country.”
Fernandez was already considered to be an enemy of France after beating Les Bleus in the 2022 final and was caught on tape two years later singing racist chants about the French players on the team bus. (He later apologized on social media.)
And more recently, he had irritated Chelsea fans last season through his not-so-secret flirtation with Real Madrid, which bubbled to the surface when he said he would love to live in the Spanish capital one day. His agent attempted to explain the comment away, but Chelsea didn’t buy it and suspended him for two games.
“He said Madrid because of the language, because it’s similar to Buenos Aires and because it’s logical,” the agent, Javier Pastore, told reporters at the time. “And also because of the culture and the weather.”
Now it seems all but certain that Fernandez will leave the club this summer, which is fast turning into the most dramatic of his career. That’s because, as much as any player not named Messi, Fernandez came to embody Argentina’s World Cup—for better and for worse.
He played a starring role in two of the team’s extraordinary late comebacks, scoring the stoppage-time winner in the 3-2 victory over Egypt and tied the game against with a screamer from 20 yards.
But against Spain, he took part in his side’s relentless harassing of a technically superior team as it racked up a World Cup final record of 26 fouls. And after a second yellow card, Fernandez became the sixth player in history—and the third from Argentina—to be sent off in the final.
From there, his 10 remaining teammates were left with their backs to the wall until Spain found the winning goal. Argentina’s physical approach, which saw them finish with all those fouls and zero shots on target, didn’t win them many friends. But when they left New Jersey as runners-up, Fernandez and the rest of La Albiceleste still had at least one ally back home.
“No one can hold anything against them,” said Argentine President Javier Milei, “because they gave their all.”
Write to Joshua Robinson at [email protected]
