Ticket prices for all events anywhere will not come back down unless we make international travel harder. There were Taylor Swift fans who flew to every concert of one of her tours. When I attended the Hungaroring Grand Prix every single person seemed to be visiting from outside Hungary. Hosting in the wealthiest country of size of course made this worse but I predict ticket prices for popular events will only keep going up and up.

Argentina received more yellow cards on its last three games. How is that a "free pass"? Cucurella should have been sent off, same as the Paraguay player for covering his mouth. Fernandez did get a yellow card for a very light challenge that he tried to avoid.. All the Argentina haters need to look at the facts. I expected more from HN.

Messi should've gotten red in the Algeria match (same ref who didn't have the balls to give star player a card, was doing the finals). Against England, Argentina were playing rugby again, and the ref just let it pass. Against Egypt, Egypt got a goal disqualified which.. was a goal. Against Switzerland, a rule of identity mismatch was used wrongly (it can only be applied on same team). Argentina was lucky to end the final with 10 players and only 1 goal against. It should've been 9 players, with a 3-0 score, but the corrupt FIFA couldn't match-fix that part. It'd have been too obvious.

>>Messi should've gotten red in the Algeria match (same ref who didn't have the balls to give star player a card, was doing the finals).

There is a big difference between an intentional and not intentional foul. There was a touch but Messi did try to stop and is clear from the video. Stop the racist campaign.

>>Against England, Argentina were playing rugby again, and the ref just let it pass.

Against England they received more yellows even considering the amount of fouls. Go have a look a Harry Kane foul against Messi. No punishment.

>>Against Egypt, Egypt got a goal disqualified which.. was a goal.

It was a foul. Clearly shown on the video. Nobody is discussing that

>>Against Switzerland, a rule of identity mismatch was used wrongly (it can only be applied on same team).

That was a clear and blatantly obvious simulation. Embolo fauls magically without a touch. That destroys the game integrity. Stop the racist campaign. That was the referee understanding at that moment. It was re-clarified few days ago.

>>Argentina was lucky to end the final with 10 players and only 1 goal against. It should've been 9 players, with a 3-0 score, but the corrupt FIFA couldn't match-fix that part. It'd have been too obvious.

Argentina had an older squad, with a great keeper. Cucurella should have been sent off, same as the player from Paraguay from provoking and covering his mouth. You just spread hateful, racist messages. Good on you.

Dude, this is gross. Stop calling people racist for disagreeing with you about Argentina. It’s not racism to call out concerns about Argentina’s play or reffing bias.

You should be embarrassed to repeatedly resort to ad hominem attacks like this.

I guess you also think the "Hand of God" goal, was also a legitimate and fair goal because something something Maradonna something something Malvinas something something god?

Look, it's football. We're all entitled to have opinions, state them with vigour and passion, but...

Step back. Is it fair to drop the "racist" slur on somebody for having a different perspective?

Referees do their best, and often get it wrong, but it seems to most people - including many neutrals - that refs got it wrong more times than not when Argentina was playing, and in Argentina's favour.

Is that a conspiracy? Well, Infantino definitely wanted Argentina in the final, so did he try and create that somehow? He seems pretty shady, it's hard for people to trust that he _didn't_.

But I'm prepared to accept it was just variance. The problem is, that variance undermined the competition for many people, in the same way hydration breaks did. It made it a worse World Cup for many fans.

I get that for an Argentinian, that seems unfair, but if this had happened to England's benefit, do you honestly think you'd be making the same accusations and would accept it if any criticism that came in their direction was met with slurs?

Peace. Chill. We're good. We're brothers in football. Let's hope we get another World Cup in our lifetimes, and that we get to enjoy it - and that means something different to what we just saw, for everyone's sake.

> But I'm prepared to accept it was just variance. The problem is, that variance undermined the competition for many people

Honestly I found it really frustrating that Balogun got that red card (and gross when political meddling suspended it) while Messi got nothing for a similar infraction. But variance is part of the game. I don’t actually think most of it is in any way malicious and I am not sure refs can do much more. So much is subjective. I’ve watched games where they hand out yellows for every minor infraction and it’s a shitty experience for everyone (fans, players, and coaches).

I do think Messi gets favoritism. He gets awarded free kicks right outside the box for softball fouls that no one else gets. But they are trying to protect their star. They don’t want the WNBA thing where every other game Clark gets egregiously fouled.

> in the same way hydration breaks did. It made it a worse World Cup for many fans.

I don’t really understand the hate for the hydration breaks. Giving athletes some water seems reasonable even if the underlying reason is ads. I think they should be 1-2 minute breaks, though.

The halftime show in the final was more egregious than the hydration.

I expected more from Argentina, yet here we are.