The Argentina team will face Spain in the final of the 2026 World Cup. This match will be played this Sunday, July 19 at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. Lionel Messi will return to this stadium after 10 years, a setting that brings back very bad memories.

The last time Lionel Messi stepped foot in this stadium with the Argentina team was in the 2016 Copa América Centenario. Specifically, it was on June 26 in the final of the tournament against the Chile team.

In that match Argentina and Chile tied 0-0. The match went to a penalty shootout. Messi missed his shot and the Albiceleste lost the match 4-2. This was a peak moment in Messi's frustration with his national team. The captain of the Albiceleste decided to renounce the calls.

"In the locker room I thought that the national team is not for me, and I have decided to end everything here (...). It has been very painful. We have lost again on penalties," Messi said after the game in statements compiled by ESPN.

Losing this final, the second in a row against Chile, motivated Messi to make this decision in advance. Comparisons with Diego Armando Maradona and the demand for a performance similar to that of FC Barcelona were the pillars of local criticism.

"It is for the good of all, we are not satisfied with reaching the final and not winning it, it's over (...) I already tried a lot, it is the third final, I tried to be champion with Argentina. It didn't happen, I couldn't achieve it," he added.

However, Messi's decision was changed within two months. The Argentine footballer returned to the national team in September in the Albiceleste's 1-0 victory against Uruguay. The most important return in the history of Argentine football. The rest is history. Messi is going for his second World Cup and transforming a bad memory into a footballing idyll with the World Cup again in his hands.