Lionel Messi has taken Argentina to another FIFA World Cup final, delivering a great performance in the Qatar 2022 semifinal against Croatia. La Albiceleste claimed a comfortable win, setting up a meeting with the winner of France vs. Morocco.
Argentina ended up winning by three, but it all started with a penaltythat in Zlatko Dalic’s eyes was controversial. Daniele Orsato gave Argentina a spot-kick as Dominik Livakovic struck Julian Alvarez in the box, and Messi found the net with a powerful shot.
From then on, Lionel Scaloni‘s side took control of the game and went on to score more goals to qualify for the final. In his postgame interview, theCroatian national team coach felt that penalty shouldn’t have been awarded in the first place.
Croatia manager questionspenalty given to Argentina
“The first goal was very suspicious to be honest,” Dalic said, via Dan Kilpatrick of the Evening Standard. “First we had the situation with the corner. Apparently it was a corner, according to the reaction of our players. Then we had the situation with the penalty… It was a little bit too cheap and easy.”
Dalic was not the only one to complain about the penalty, though, as Luka Modric had strong words for Orsato. Either way, the dream is over for Croatia, who will now have to play in the third-place game against France or Morocco.Using this World Cup Predictor, you can see every potential outcome of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.