Dressing room footage from Argentina’s celebrations after winning their World Cup quarter-final 3-1 in extra-time has reignited one of football’s fiercest rivalries.
Lionel Messi’s reigning world champions will meet England in Atlanta in the semi-finals on Thursday morning (5am AEST) and there will be no love lost on and off the pitch.
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As Argentina rejoiced after their latest World Cup escape act, their players chanted a song that references the 1982 Falklands War between Argentina and England.
“Las Malvinas, por Diego [Maradona] and por la ultima de Leo [Messi]” is what the players proclaimed, meaning “for the Falklands, for Diego and for Leo’s last”.
‘Las Malvinas’ is the Argentine term for the Falkland Islands in Spanish.
The South Atlantic archipelago was the centre of a ten-week conflict between the two nations 44 years ago.
Argentina invaded and occupied the British overseas territory – which a British settlement claimed for themselves in 1774 after their Spanish counterparts departed – claiming they were retaking Argentine territory.
Argentina surrendered after 74 days following the British government sending a naval dispatch to the islands as well as conducting an amphibious assault.
But the bad blood persisted between the two nations and football became the vehicle for retribution.
Only two years after the war ended, Argentina and England met in a World Cup quarter-final at Mexico City’s iconic Estadio Azteca.
The two nations already had a history of angst on the football pitch.
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They met in the quarter-finals in 1966 with eventual champions England winning a heated contest at London’s Wembley Stadium 1-0 via a goal from Geoff Hurst that the Argentines insisted was off-side.
It was when Antonio Ratten was sent off that tensions truly boiled over, however.
The Argentina captain refused to leave the pitch with a standoff lasting almost eight minutes.
As he eventually left the playing surface, Rattin crumbled up an English theme corner flag and then sat on a red carpet meant for Queen Elizabeth II.
The English were furious with manager Alf Ramsey stopping his players from swapping shirts after the game and then calling the Argentines “animals” in his press conference.
“It was clear that the referee played with an England shirt on,” a furious Rattin said after the game.
The match was dubbed “el robo del siglo” in Argentina, meaning “the theft of the century”.
A similar line would be used in England in 1984.
Gary Lineker scored the opener for England, his sixth of the tournament – a joint record for an Englishman in a World Cup alongside Harry Kane in 2018 and Jude Bellingham in the current campaign.
But then the match was all about Diego Maradona.
The Argentine legend scored twice to eliminate the English.
His second goal was one of the best ever scored in a World Cup.
Maradona danced past five Englishman to score what was regarded as one of the goals of the century.
But his first goal was far more memorable.
Every football fan, young or old, knows the ‘hand of God’.
The ball was played into the English box and Maradona soared into the air to get there before England goalkeeper Peter Shilton.
The only issue was that the ball clearly came off Maradona’s hand.
In the modern day, VAR would have ruled it out, but the Argentine superstar raced off in celebration and the referee did not question it.
Asked in his post-match conference how he had scored the first of his brace, Maradona replied: “A little with the head of Maradona and a little with the hand of God.”
And thus the name was born.
Years later, Maradona was more scathing of his opponents when reflecting on his two goals in his autobiography.
“I sometimes think I preferred the one with my hand,” he wrote. “It was a bit like stealing the wallet of the English.”
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While he admitted that the Falklands War had served as inspiration at the Azteca.
“Although we had said before the game that football had nothing to do with the Malvinas war, we knew they had killed a lot of Argentine boys there, killed them like little birds. And this was revenge,” Maradona said.
On the other side of the coin, the hurt will not seem to go away for the English.
“I still feel the injustice now,” England defender Terry Butcher told Sky Sports in 2016.
“People tell you to let it go, but we felt we could go all the way that year and you still think about what might have been. It was probably the best piece of fraud you will ever see – and he got away with it.”
Argentina got one over England again in 1998.
The South Americans won a thrilling World Cup Round of 16 clash on penalties after they finished locked at 2-2 at the end of extra-time.
But the shootout is not what the knockout contest is remembered for.
That belongs to David Beckham’s red card.
The then-Manchester United superstar was everywhere in the late 1990s.
He was the poster boy of English football, but a moment of madness made him public enemy number one in his homeland.
Diego Simeone fouled Beckham.
With Beckham on the ground, Simeone went to ruffle his hair.
Beckham threw his foot back in response.
Simeone went to ground.
The Argentines appealed and the referee showed Beckham a red card for violent conduct.
England were down to ten men, but they held on to reach penalties.
David Batty and Paul Ince’s misses handed victory to Argentina, but Beckham copped the wrath of the English public.
When the following Premier League season began, he was booed at every away stadium Manchester United went to and harassed in public.
“To walk down the street and see people look at you in a certain way, spit at you, abuse you, come up to your face and say some of the things that they said,” Beckham said in his 2023 Netflix series.
“That’s difficult… The whole country hated me.”
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While an interview a year later, Simeone admitted that he had done Beckham dirty.
“Let’s just say the referee fell into the trap,” he told reporters.
“It was also a difficult one for him to have avoided because I went down well and in moments like that there’s a lot of tension.
“You could say that my falling transformed a yellow card into a red card. But in fact, the most appropriate punishment was a yellow one.”
Beckham got his revenge four years later in Japan when he scored a penalty in England’s 1-0 group stage victory.
That win led to Argentina finishing third in the group.
It was the only time in the last 50 years that the three-time champions have failed to make it to the knockout stage of a World Cup.
The two countries have met once since in a 2005 friendly in Switzerland – which England won 3-2.
Their more than two decade avoidance of one another means that Messi has never faced England in his international career.
And based on his teammates’ dressing room antics, his history is clearly on their minds.
Given the ferocity of the history between the two nations, it feels like a fascinating chapter is still to come.
With Argentina being regularly accused of receiving favouritism by FIFA and the fiasco of England’s opening goal coming after the ball hit a camera wire against Norway, perhaps the latest controversy will surround VAR.