Thousands of Argentinian fans celebrate the team’s triumph at the World Cup in Qatar on Sunday in Buenos Aires AGUSTIN MARCARIAN (Portal)
Like a celebratory Stations of the Cross, hundreds of thousands of Argentines will accompany the winning team in Qatar on Tuesday in a long procession to the obelisk. The starting point is AFA’s premises in Ezeiza, just a few minutes from the international airport. Lionel Messi and his team-mates will arrive in Buenos Aires around 2am aboard a chartered plane with a stopover in Rome. After the break, they board a topless bus and, holding the World Cup, travel the 30 kilometers to the Obelisk, the epicenter of Buenos Aires’ grand celebrations.
The scale on the obelisk was confirmed by the AFA on Monday. It remains to be seen if there will be another one at Casa Rosada, about 10 blocks from there. The president, Alberto Fernández, made available the balcony of the seat of government, from which Juan Domingo Perón addressed the crowds gathered in Plaza de Mayo for the Albiceleste players to greet the fans. The champion teams did the same in 1978 and 1986, but the political atmosphere is not the same this time.
At the first World Cup, Jorge Rafael Videla’s dictatorship didn’t leave too many options. In the second, Argentina had only three years of democracy and the trophy won by Diego Maradona’s team in Mexico was interpreted as a symbol of a new country. Then-President Raúl Alfonsín gave the players the balcony and stayed in the background. This time the political polarization is total and any gesture by the President can stoke the fire. Fernández even turned down an invitation from his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, to share a box in Qatar. There is also the memory of the wake at Casa Rosada de Maradona on November 20, 2020, when a crowded crowd jumped the fence and entered the building.
The players have the last word. At the moment they have focused on the return. Before the game, they toured Doha on a bus surrounded by the Argentines who had packed the Lusail Stadium hours earlier. Then they started again with the trophy on board. They took care of her like a child. Dibu Martínez uploaded a photo of him cradling her in his arms with the caption ‘I could make him upa’, a nod to Messi’s speech in the preview of the Copa America game against Brazil where he recalled it that the goalkeeper had been a father for the competition. Messi also uploaded his photo with the trophy in hand, sitting alone in the first class sector of the plane. Nicolás Tagliafico had fun with the trophy protected by the seat belt.
The tribute to the players will be a major security challenge. On Sunday, more than a million people gathered around the obelisk in the largest concentration in living memory. When Messi and the trophy are there, the crowd can be even bigger.
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