The Argentina national football team is preparing for the match against Austria in the 2026 World Cup. Lionel Scaloni's team is focusing on the second match of the tournament, after a convulsive start. Lionel Messi was in training in Kansas, with a ball at his feet, playing and training with his teammates. The group that has always supported him is still embracing him. It was Messi himself who said it after the match against Algeria: 'I'm grateful to the delegation and my teammates because they're by my side'. In recent weeks, social media has been flooded with videos of Lionel Scaloni talking about tactics and strategy in the run-up to the World Cup. But it was journalist Roberto Parrottino who hit the nail on the head: 'Lionel Scaloni is a socio-affective coach'. Through his viral posts, you can see different fragments where the coach himself talks about how important the group is to his team. In one of them, he said: 'In times of difficulty, it's your teammate who gets you through. We always say that with the person you're with, if you get along better, things will be easier'. When something affects someone you care about, it affects everyone, and that's a good thing. Some might say that in football, it doesn't matter, but I think it does, because you can go out onto the pitch with that teammate who feels things the same way you do. I'm convinced that gives you an edge: if you get along better with the person you're with'. Last Tuesday, after the match against Algeria, Lionel Messi broke down as he had done on the pitch. He said something in front of the cameras that few people knew: he was going through a tough time. But he also launched: 'I'm grateful to the delegation and my teammates because they're by my side'. It's the same group that broke down the barriers of shame. Rodrigo De Paul has said on several occasions that, in the first training session he shared with Messi when Lionel Scaloni was already the coach, he approached the room, knocked on the door, and, full of doubts, said: 'Hey, Lionel, do you want to have a mate in the room?'. Leandro Paredes was by his side. With a couple of questions, something that was hindering the relationship was broken, and that barrier was destroyed. They went to the room to have some mate, like in the club, like in the neighborhood. It's the same group that, on July 10, 2021, at the final whistle in the Maracaná, after Ángel Di María's goal, ran to hug him when they won the Copa América. The image is clear. Everyone went after him. At that time, everyone wanted to win for him. Everyone wanted to give the Argentina national football team a title for Messi. The same unity was seen in Qatar, and every moment they shared afterwards became a reality. In the documentary 'El Metodo Scaloni', the national team coach said: 'Most Argentines understand football, 4-3-3, 4-4-2. But there are things that are fundamental and don't have to do with technique, tactics, or strategy; they have more to do with another aspect. Because you get along well with the other person; because of that ball, because they're your friend, you'll give more. I was raised with that; we're all together, we make a mate and start talking to them about how they're doing, about life, about whether they're changing clubs, things that maybe others don't do'.