Otamendi starts for Argentina

Otamendi, Benfica's captain, started Argentina's opening match in Group B of the Paris 2024 Men's Olympic Football Tournament on Wednesday, July 24. The Albiceleste lost 1-2 to Morocco on Matchday 1.

At the Stade Geoffroy Guichard (Saint-Étienne), the Reds' central defender was captain and played full-time.

After trailing 0-2, the Argentinians reduced the deficit through Giuliano Simeone in the 68th minute (1-2) and managed to put the ball in the back of the net again in the 90th minute through Cristian Medina (2-2). The next moment, however, there was a huge mix-up.

After the celebrations for the Argentine goal, misbehavior in the stands forced the players to quickly go to the dressing rooms. With the players from both teams in the dressing rooms, and given the late timing of the goal, it was widely believed that the match had been declared over. However, the match had only been interrupted, as the event's official website later reported.

At that moment, information began to circulate that the game would be resumed, because... Medina's goal had not yet been made official, and the VAR had yet to validate it, which, after reviewing the play, had actually disallowed the goal for offside. It was also decided that three more minutes would be played.

More than an hour later, the two teams returned to the pitch. There, with the crowd no longer in the stands, neither Argentina nor Morocco scored, and the match ended in a 1-2 victory for Morocco.

Otamendi made one clearance, one interception and one tackle, while also performing 79 actions with the ball, achieving a 96% pass accuracy rate (66 out of 69), according to data from the Sofascore platform.

Argentina's Olympic team still has Ukraine and Iraq in its group, and this is precisely the Albiceleste's next opponent in Round 2. The match against the Iraqis is scheduled for Saturday, July 27 at 2 pm (3 pm local time) at the Lyon Stadium.