Argentina return home after suspended match

The Argentine team returned home following the scandalous suspension of the 2022 World Cup qualifying match against Brazil. The Argentine team landed in Ezeiza a few minutes after midnight, according to reports from Argentine media.

Although Emiliano Martínez, Emiliano Buendía, Giovani Lo Celso and Cristian Romero -- the Premier League players in the squad – were in the chartered flight of the Argentine team, they left Brazil as deportees.

The Argentine ambassador in Brazil accompanied the squad to the airport. "Already completing the procedures at the Sao Paulo airport so that they can all return to the country together," he wrote on his Twitter account, with an image of the players and another with Lionel Messi.

Photo: Instagram

Amid incredible scenes at Sao Paulo's Neo Quimica Arena, the match between the two giants of South American football was halted when Brazilian health officials ran onto the pitch, triggering a melee involving team officials and players from both sides.

The stunning intervention came just hours after health authorities in Brazil said four England-based players in Argentina's squad should be placed in "immediate quarantine" for breaching Covid-19 protocols.

The sides were just seven minutes into the match, which was played in front of only 1,500 spectators because of coronavirus restrictions.

According to Brazil's National Health Surveillance Agency (ANVISA), the Premier League players -- Giovani Lo Celso and Cristian Romero of Tottenham, and Aston Villa's Emiliano Martinez and Emiliano Buendia -- provided "false information" upon their entry to Brazil.