After his brace earns Argentina a World Cup berth, superstar sets eyes on winning marquee event
Argentina international Lionel Messi has admitted that he dreams of guiding his country to World Cup glory in Brazil next year.
Lionel Messi celebrates after scoring against Paraguay. Pic/AFP
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Alejandro Sabella’s men beat Paraguay 5-2 yesterday evening to seal qualification for next summer’s showpiece and the Barcelona star is eager to follow in the footsteps of Diego Maradona and steer la Albiceleste to their first world title since 1986.
“I dream of winning the World Cup. We all do in Argentina. But there is still a long way to go,” Messi told reporters after his side’s away victory over Paraguay.
“We got what we wanted, but it was difficult to play here. The most important thing was to qualify as soon as possible. We want to continue like this and we want to keep winning.”
Messi also briefly reacted to rumours that Barcelona have asked the Argentine football association (Afa) to leave the attacker out of the squad for their remaining two World Cup qualifiers and stressed that he always wants to play for the national team.u00a0“I don’t know anything about that. I always want to play for Argentina.”
Making the cut
> Brazil (hosts)
> South America: Argentina
> Europe: Netherlands, Italy
> CONCACAF: USA, Costa Rica
> Asia: Japan, S Korea, Australia, Iran
> Africa and Oceania: No teamsu00a0
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