Chapter 179

In fact, Raphael was not disfigured, but Vargas's swinging elbow hit him right in the center of his face, causing his nose to bleed all over his face, which looked a little oozing......

The team doctor rushed into the field and initially diagnosed that his nose bone might be broken, so although Rafael was very reluctant, he was carried off the field on a stretcher.

This episode squandered the little time left in Peru, after Vargas was sent off, the referee read the seconds and blew the final whistle directly, Argentina beat Peru 2-1 to advance to the semi-finals!

Perhaps it was because Peru failed to cause an upset, a result that was expected by the media, so in addition to the three goals in the game that routinely dominated the headlines, Rafael's bloodstained field also received a lot of attention.

Especially when a close-up photo of his face covering his face and falling to the ground, with blood flowing from between his fingers, appeared in the news media, it broke the hearts of many fans who love Rafael.

After the game, the Peruvian captain, who calmed down, also defended his lethal move, saying that he didn't mean it, but was used to spreading his arms during the aerial battle, and felt very sorry for accidentally injuring Rafael.

Veteran Vargas was able to remain calm in front of the camera replays, and in fact, no one could prove that his elbow was intentional.

His apology was not understood by the Argentine fans, and no one cared, but Rafael's injury was good news - his nasal bridge bone was not broken, but the left side fracture and the rupture of the nasal mucosa, which was already a blessing in misfortune compared to the former, as long as the swelling was reduced by a drip and the reduction surgery was performed. If you recover properly, you might be able to make it to the Copa America final......

Rafael, who felt that his teammates were becoming more and more stable, was optimistic about this, and did not think about whether there was a place for him in the national team after recovering from injury, especially since his disobedient performance in this game had aroused Batista's alarm.

In short, when Messi went to visit Rafael after the game, the most impressive thing was not the weirdly swollen face of the little angel due to the injury of the bridge of his nose, but the glittering in the beautiful eyes of the other party who looked at him burningly.

Messi suddenly felt so stressed.

Batista didn't give the players any more time off this time, and pulled the team back to La Plata City directly after the incident, which undoubtedly made the already only 3 days of preparation time even more urgent.

And as soon as they got off the plane, they got another piece of news that was not too good.

Their opponent in the semi-finals came out, and it was Uruguay.

Colombia failed to snipe this team that was getting better and better, and stopped in the quarterfinals 1:2, which made Colombian fans sad and disappointed at the same time, and also made the Argentines sigh.

While Uruguay didn't do well in the group stage, and Argentina had the advantage in one of the few meetings between the two sides in the last decade, no one could really underestimate them. Compared to this, Colombia, of course, has played in this Copa America and is still a loser, which is more like a soft persimmon.

But by the next day, the Argentine's slight disappointments had completely turned into surprise and schadenfreude—

Brazil was eliminated by Paraguay!

The attacking football of the Samba Army faced the fierce Paraguay once again collapsed, with 22 shots on goal and 7 shots, more than Paraguay's entire number of shots, but it was a pity that they could not break through the door of Paraguay until the end, and the two sides exchanged blanks for 120 minutes and had to enter a brutal penalty shootout. What's even more incredible is that Elano, Thiago Silva, Andre Santos, and Fred took turns on the field, bringing four missed penalties, none of which needed a fifth, and Paraguay successfully advanced to the semi-finals thanks to goals from Barreto and Estigalivia.

The cheers of the Argentine audience at the scene were the last impressions of the Brazilians present on this Copa America.

How much of a wave Rafael made in Brazil's penalty shootout, but he could guess that Brazil lost so ugly, and he must be on the cusp, although he was a little shocked by the suffocating penalty hit rate of his neighbors, he didn't pay much attention to it.

Rafael's face wound healed quickly, and two days later, he returned to the training ground with his Zorro mask.

In this final preparation time, Batista is training on his team's penalty kicks.

The match between Brazil and Paraguay was a reminder to the coach that although Brazil were really unlucky in this game, they would lose, and it was also related to the Paraguayans' efforts from the first minute of the game to get to a penalty shootout 0:0.

Argentina's goal efficiency is really not very high, and luck is not very good, so Batista also has to pay attention to what to do if the game has to be dragged into penalty time?

However, this may be a happy annoyance for Batista, after all, there are still a lot of good penalty takers in the team, so his focus is more on goalkeeper Romero.

When Rafael returned, he saw Romero doing a fluttering session.