Refereeing decisions 'nothing to do' with Argentina defeat, says Scaloni

Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni on Thursday came out in defence of his players after a 2-1 defeat to Paraguay, an opponent he praised. "I'm not here to criticise my players, I'm here to support them," Scaloni said during a press conference after the 11th round of qualifiers at the Defensores del Chaco stadium in Asuncion.
"We knew it was going to be a complicated game and that's that," he said, trying to play down the result. He insisted that he and his assistants are there to "give confidence" to the players. When asked about the match in the Paraguayan capital, Scaloni said that they were in control of the ball during the first half, a situation that changed after the second goal scored at the start of the second half and which, he said, made "the game difficult".
"We tried, which is the important thing. We tried in our own way, but it wasn't possible. We have to congratulate our opponents and it's clear that they defended well and they have experienced players," added Scaloni after admitting that it was “difficult” for them. On the refereeing, he admitted that he could "say a lot of things", but refrained from doing so that people "don't see it as an excuse".
"That has nothing to do with the result, which Paraguay won," he acknowledged. Looking ahead to the match against Peru on Tuesday, he said he was concerned with "correcting" and "looking at the things that can be improved". However, he said that this is an opponent ‘that will be totally different to this one, they play in a different way, with a different system’ and acknowledged that "it has its difficulties, as are the South American qualifiers".