Argentina squad v Ecuador (and Brazil)

With the season coming to an end, it will soon be time for another double-header of World Cup qualifiers in South America. With hosts Brazil not playing qualifiers, each South American nation has one of these double rounds in which they only play one qualifier rather than the normal two, and this time round it’s Argentina’s turn for that. They’ll play Ecuador on the 2nd June in the Estadio Monumental, and then fly to New York to take on Brazil in a friendly the following weekend. Alejandro Sabella has named the foreign-based players who’ll take part in both matches (the squad will be supplemented with a few domestic-based players for each match; probably different ones). Read on to find out who the players called up are, and for details of how to book on a Football De Tour to Argentina v Ecuador with myself and Daniel Colasimone, if you’re going to be in Buenos Aires on the 2nd June.

Goalkeepers
Sergio Romero (Sampdoria, Italy)

Defenders
Hugo Campagnaro (Napoli, Italy)
Federico Fernández (Napoli)
Ezequiel Garay (Benfica, Portugal)
Matías Rodríguez (Universidad de Chile, Chile)
Marcos Rojo (Spartak Moscow, Russia)
Pablo Zabaleta (Manchester City, England)

Midfielders
Ángel Di María (Real Madrid, Spain)
Fernando Gago (Roma, Italy)
Pablo Guiñazú (Internacional, Brazil)
Javier Mascherano (Barcelona, Spain)
Maximiliano Rodríguez (Liverpool, England)
Eduardo Salvio (Atlético de Madrid, Spain)
José Sosa (Metalist Kharkiv, Ukraine)

Forwards
Sergio Agüero (Manchester City)
Gonzalo Higuaín (Real Madrid)
Ezequiel Lavezzi (Napoli)
Lionel Messi (Barcelona)

If you’ll be in Buenos Aires on the 2nd June and want to attend Argentina v Ecuador with two journalists who make our livings writing about Argentine football for foreign audiences, and who’ll sort out the tickets and do the hard thinking about public transport routes to and from the stadium for you in advance, Daniel Colasimone and I are running a special Football De Tour for this game (have a look at the Tours page here on HEGS for more of an idea of what we do every weekend for people passing through BA who want to get to games). The price, given the quality of the players on display, will be US$120 per person, and we’ll be getting tickets with a decent, unobstructed view of the pitch, along the side rather than behind a goal.

If you want to come with us, you should email me at sam@hastaelgolsiempre.com by the end of Thursday, 24th May.

You can follow the latest news from the selección and Argentina’s foreign legion of players, as well as the domestic championship, River Plate’s first second division campaign in over a century and the ever entertaining/tragic/infuriating capers of Julio Grondona & chums direct from Buenos Aires with HEGS on Twitter. If you’ve not signed up yet you can do so here. You can also join the official HEGS Facebook group, to keep up to date with the latest posts on the blog and discuss things with other fans. You’ll find it here. And remember to bookmark Hand Of Pod, our Argentine football podcast, or if you prefer you can subscribe to it on iTunes here.