The Fan Zone

Even by the arcane standards of soccer songs and chants, the Argentine team’s locker room number required some explanation. “Thirty-two years later,” it proposes “Scaloni will avenge / the Cup stolen from number ten! . . . for Las Malvinas! / For El Diego! / For the last one with Leo! / Argentina wants to see a repeat champion!” Investigating these lyrics, you might find thirty-two-year-old highlights of Argentina’s exit from the 1994 World Cup, the last in North America: a 3–2 loss to Romania in the Round of 16. But the footage hardly explains a three-decade-old grudge—in it, Argentina benefits from a dubious penalty, only to lose anyway to a counterattacking clinic by Romania’s Gheorghe Hagi.