Gary Neville left his fellow ITV pundits in hysterics after a remark about Donald Trump and Lionel Messi during the coverage of Argentina vs Egypt at the World Cup. The last-16 tie between the two countries was taking place in Atlanta on Tuesday afternoon, with a place in the quarter-final up for grabs. Argentina were on the back foot early in the match after Egypt took the lead thanks to a goal from Yasser Ibrahim. The reigning world champions then had the opportunity to equalise in the first half after a penalty was awarded for a foul by Haissem Hassan on Nicolas Tagliafico. Messi stepped up to take the penalty and saw his low effort saved by Egypt goalkeeper Mostafa Shobeir.
Panel Reacts to Messi's Miss
The topic of Messi’s penalty miss was discussed during ITV’s half-time coverage, where Neville was joined by Ian Wright and Roy Keane. Keane was the first to discuss the missed spot-kick, with the Manchester United legend stating that they believed in the studio that Messi would not find the back of the net. "To be fair, we were watching it here and Wrighty - we didn't fancy him," Keane said. "We know his record isn't great. As Ally [McCoist] mentioned [in commentary], for a great player - almost lacking belief in himself, it's amazing."
Neville's Trump Comment
The question was then posed to the panel as to whether anyone could step in to take Messi off penalty duty, which led to Neville replying: “[Donald] Trump?", which led to laughter from the panel. Wright then explained that any player would find it difficult to step up and take penalties for Argentina in Messi's place due to his standing in the game. "I can't imagine anybody," Wright said. “Can you imagine being in that dressing room? It's like saying to [Cristiano] Ronaldo: 'No, I'll take them'. [Lionel] Scaloni's not going to say that, either." Neville then went on to add: "They're impossible, these players at that stature, to be able to communicate with around stuff like this. They want every penalty, they want every free-kick."
Second Half Action
In the second half, Egypt thought they had doubled their advantage thanks to a goal from Ziko, only for the effort to be ruled out for a foul in the build-up. However, just minutes later Ziko did go on to score a second goal for Egypt to give his country a 2-0 lead in Atlanta. The winner of the match between Argentina and Egypt will go on to face either Switzerland or Colombia in the quarter-final.
