Spain won the World Cup final against Argentina with a goal scored in the second half of extra time, after Argentina had one of their best players sent off. According to many neutral observers (including The Economist and former German international Toni Kroos), the two teams behaved very differently on the pitch. Spain dominated possession, played attacking football, and created far more goal-scoring opportunities. Argentina, by contrast, resorted to a much more physical style, defending by almost any means in an effort to reach a penalty shoot-out, and several of their players reacted poorly after the defeat. Their greatest player, Lionel Messi, who throughout his career had been exemplary on the pitch, also resorted on this occasion to gamesmanship in an attempt to deceive the referee. In short, many neutral observers concluded that Spain played football, whereas Argentina played anti-football.
This should not be taken as a criticism of Argentine football in general, still less of the Argentine people. Historically, Argentina has been far more successful than Spain in this sport by playing football rather than anti-football. The country has produced, in my view, the greatest player of all time (Maradona) and the player who has sustained the highest level of performance for the longest period (Messi). These two players—along with many others, including Alfredo Di Stéfano before them—and numerous Argentine coaches have made European clubs and leagues stronger than they otherwise would have been. Nor do I believe there is a distinctively Argentine style of play that is inherently aggressive. Argentine football has long been divided into different traditions—for example, the bilardistas and the menottistas—and many Argentine players have been celebrated for their elegance and technical ability.
Beyond football, I admire Argentine actors, writers, human rights activists and lawyers, journalists, sports commentators, academics, chefs, dancers, and many others. Argentina is a great country, and I think it is a privilege for Barcelona, my city, that so many Argentines now live here.
Nor should the exemplary behaviour of the Spanish players in this World Cup, or in recent years more generally, be taken as evidence that Spaniards behave better than Argentines in other walks of life. We have nothing to teach Argentines in that respect. The national team at this World Cup represented Spain at its very best, but we are clearly not always like that in many other domains.
Today, Argentine and Spanish players compete—or have competed—in the same clubs and leagues, almost all of them in Europe. FC Barcelona, the club that contributed the largest number of players to the Spanish national team, was for many years Lionel Messi's club and became famous for its elegant style of play. Atlético Madrid was represented by several players on both sides. Argentina's coach, Lionel Scaloni, played for Spanish clubs and lives in Spain with his family.
The question of why the Argentine and Spanish players behaved so differently in the final is therefore both interesting and difficult to answer. They speak the same language and they broadly belong to the same culture.
It is well known that high-powered incentives can backfire. Agency theory in economics suggests that when success depends on multiple dimensions of effort, very strong incentives to achieve a single objective may encourage agents to resort to dirty tricks rather than pursue all dimensions of performance fairly. Whether they choose fair play or gamesmanship depends on their own abilities, those of their opponents, and the prevailing conventions and institutional norms. In World Cup history, Italian defenders Claudio Gentile (1982) and Marco Materazzi (2006) illustrate how playing on the edge—or beyond it—can sometimes be successful. Argentina itself could easily have won the last final.
It will be interesting to see what happens if Italy appoints Pep Guardiola as national coach, as has been rumoured. Carlo Ancelotti's appointment as Brazil coach did not work out. Coaches, players, and national football cultures do not always fit together. José Mourinho's possible return to Real Madrid for a second spell might even amount to an admission that the only way to defeat FC Barcelona's football in Spain is through Mourinho's anti-football. Whether that would work remains to be seen.
The more interesting question is why Argentina embraced anti-football on this occasion. Why did this particular norm prevail?
Economics Nobel laureate Daron Acemoglu has suggested, on X, that the answer might lie in his theory of institutions.
The argument—originally proposed on X by the Turkish professor Veysi Çeri—was that the Argentine team began committing increasingly serious fouls and became more aggressive after the match because earlier, relatively minor transgressions had gone unpunished. This gradually changed the perceived norms and rules of the game, making further transgressions seem acceptable. The argument referred exclusively to the Argentine squad. Acemoglu prefaced his comments by saying that he was not sure this was the correct explanation, but that he found it intriguing. I do too. I find it intriguing because it parallels the way political leaders and other influential figures—including business leaders—may become increasingly willing to break rules when norms are not enforced against them. Acemoglu was making no claim whatsoever about Argentina or Argentines in general. As he himself made clear, the principal example he had in mind was Donald Trump in the United States.
I am also tempted to relate Argentina's anti-football to the broader political climate associated with Trump and Javier Milei, although I recognise that I may be biased. Another economist, Branko Milanović, offers a simpler explanation rooted in football itself:
"Did people make analogies (they must have but I have not seen them) between Argentina 1990 and Argentina 2026? Ruling champions. Strategy based on two pivots: the best player in the world in his decline & a phenomenal goalkeeper. Anti-football with the objective to get to the penalty kicks. Strategy that worked perfectly until the final. And a very narrow loss."
Whatever the true explanation—which is probably complex and multi-causal—it is important to understand why people sometimes choose anti-football over the best football they are capable of playing, even when those people are the same individuals, as in Messi's case. More broadly, we should ask why people sometimes choose anti-politics over politics. In politics, democracy and even the survival of the planet are at stake. As we know, human beings are capable of the very best, but also of the very worst. The challenge is to understand how we can bring out the best in ourselves.
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