Chile (National Football)

FIFA have banned Lionel Messi for four international matches after finding the player guilty of verbally abusing an assistant referee.

The world governing body issued a statement on its official website confirming its decision after the incident, which occurred as Messi featured against Chile for his country.

The statement read:

The FIFA Disciplinary Committee – in application of articles 77 a) and 108 of the FIFA Disciplinary Code (FDC) – has reached a decision in relation to the case of Lionel Messi following an incident that occurred during the match between Argentina and Chile on 23 March 2017 as part of the qualifying competition for the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia™:

Lionel Messi has been found guilty of violating art. 57 of the FDC for having directed insulting words at an assistant referee.

The Barcelona superstar also received a fine of CHF 10,000, with the ban starting Tuesday as Argentina face Bolivia in World Cup qualification in La Paz.

The game is vital for the South American giants as they hold on to their qualification berth by a narrow margin in the standings.

Messi will miss the majority of the remaining qualification fixtures, and his absence could have severe ramifications on Argentina's prospects of featuring at Russia 2018.

Arsenal star Alexis Sanchez will have an upcoming court date after receiving a speeding ticket for going 155 kilometers per hour, or 96 miles per hour, per ESPN FC.

The incident took place in the Buin area, south of Chile's capital Santiago, with the forward currently home for an international break. 

He received a fine and will go to court on April 12.

Sanchez is in his third season with Arsenal and currently ranks third in the Premier League with 18 goals in 27 appearances.

While the club is falling down the table due to a recent slide in results, the 28-year-old's immediate concern is likely with his national team as Chile attempts to qualify for the 2018 World Cup.

The squad suffered a 1-0 loss to Argentina, which resulted in a reported tantrum from Sanchez, according to Wally Downes Jr. of The Sun.

Chile will face Venezuela in another qualifier Tuesday. Arsenal's next match is Sunday against Manchester City. 

Chile have beaten Argentina in the Copa America final, retaining the crown.

In the video above, Bleacher Report's Sam Tighe talks about Chile's star, surprise and flop from the match.

Last year Chile won the Copa America for the first time in their history. Now La Roja are starting to believe they can do it again.

However, roll back to the evening of June 10—when they were drawing 1-1 with Bolivia in the 99th minute of a gritty clash—and the wave of confidence they are currently riding wasn't even a speck on the horizon.

Having been beaten by Argentina in the tournament's first game, going down 2-1 in Santa Clara, California, Chile had travelled from the south-west to the north-east, and touched down in Foxborough, Massachusetts.

They had fought and scrapped against a Bolivia side determined to drag them down to earth and gain some revenge for the 5-0 beating they were handed by Chile in last year's Copa America.

This was a drab clash, only lit up by a brilliant free-kick by Jhasmani Campos to equalise Arturo Vidal's opener for Chile.

Eight minutes were added on and in the additional minute after those, Luis Gutierrez was adjudged to have handled in his own box, which seemed an extremely harsh decision. La Roja didn't care.

Vidal stepped up, now in the 100th minute, and stroked home the penalty to earn his side three vital points.

Lucky as it was, that was the moment which turned Chile's tournament around. It was salvation, when they had seemed doomed to draw and be on the verge of elimination; a weak attempt to defend the title they had waited 99 years to win.

They came into the next game against Panama—a direct shootout for qualification to the quarter-finals—more confident, alert and closer to their usual level.

Coach Jorge Sampaoli carried on the excellent work done by Marcelo Bielsa, and that is new manager Juan Antonio Pizzi's job too.

When he took over in January, it seemed a difficult job because the team seemed to have peaked, it wasn't as hungry having won the Copa, and Pizzi was following up a coach the fans adored.

He looked to have replicated the attacking form of Sampaoli's Chile, but the defence was unorganised and lacked intensity against Panama, leading to two goals conceded and showing up the team’s faults.

Admittedly Claudio Bravo was culpable for both goals, and the Barcelona goalkeeper also made some mistakes in the other group games. However, he kept a clean sheet against Mexico as Chile played the perfect match to defeat their quarter-final opponents 7-0, back in Santa Clara.

This was a perfect storm—Mexico couldn’t have been worse, nor Chile better. Pizzi said he couldn’t really explain why his team scored so many in this game but not in some of the other matches, sticking to a conservative line of implying his team has been playing fairly well all along.

Per ESPN, he said:

I don't have a magic wand to say that today, we will score seven goals and we're going to play great like we did today. No, these are things that come up, that we believe that we created.

My explanation as to why we played this way? It's because we had actually been playing this way and we adjusted minor details, like the definition of those plays at goal [the finishing], and we focus a lot more and we were more concentrated on the game.

...

This group of players has been playing and has been writing many more pages of the most brilliant story of Chilean football. We hope that we can continue adding more pages to this great book. We hope that we can continue incorporating our contribution and achieving objectives, which is what we want.

To some extent, he has a point. the team’s finishing has improved greatly. Vidal struck twice in the Bolivia game and defender Jose Fuenzalida scored a consolation goal against Argentina, but Chile’s strikers were anonymous.

No goals for Alexis Sanchez, no goals for Eduardo Vargas. Now they have three and six respectively. The performance levels of both these players, along with Vidal’s, have risen sharply with each match that comes.

Against Mexico, Sanchez was a magnet that defenders couldn’t help but be sucked close to, as they fretted over what he was going to do with the ball. Often that was looking for Vargas, who gleefully bundled home four goals on one of the best days of his football career.

Edson Puch scored the other two, while Sanchez was also on target, with one goal not real reward for his strong performance.

Vidal missed a handful of reasonable chances, but he was the all-action midfielder who drove the team on, covering every blade of grass and showing why they used to call him Cometierra (eats ground) when he played for amateur side Rodelindo FC Roman.

He started at six years old and grew a reputation for being a player who gave his all. The nickname came because he left each match covered in dirt and dust from the field which was just yards from his house.

Vidal started the Copa America well last year, but after an incident in which he was arrested for drink-driving, his tournament went downhill even as his team-mates thrived.

Chile won the cup but it was not because of the man dubbed "El Rey"—the king. This year it is Vidal helping to pull the team up by its boot straps, along with Alexis and Vargas.

The latter has never shone for long at club level but has a hugely impressive 30 goals from 57 matches with his national side. His finishing was merciless against Mexico, with each strike sending more El Tri fans packing from a 70,000-seater stadium they had virtually filled by themselves.

Chile delivered the performance of the tournament against one of the best sides in it, and they now have to seriously be considered as potential winners themselves. They will be favourites against Colombia and logic dictates they would then face Argentina in the final.

They beat the Albiceleste last year in Santiago in the final and to do so again would be quite remarkable.

One gigantic thrashing of Mexico doesn’t necessarily mean that anything that was not working under Pizzi, such as the frail defence, has suddenly been fixed.

Playing against the world’s best, Lionel Messi, is enough to undo even the most consistently tight back line on the planet, but Chile stopped him at their own Estadio Nacional in 2015 and a good performance against Colombia would give them the confidence to believe they could repeat that at the MetLife Stadium in New Jersey on June 26.

"Everybody knows what Messi is. He is the best player in the world," Vidal told Goal.

Vidal is suspended for the semi-final in Chicago on June 22, having been booked twice in the tournament thus far. He will be a huge miss for his team, but then again, if they do the job without him, then he will have had extra rest before the final.

"It would be great to meet the Argentines again because they are the best national team in the world, and we are up there fighting," the Bayern Munich star added.

"I am sad, but confident in what my team-mates can do. These games come with a risk, I hope I can play the final."

"Chi-Chi-Chi! Le-Le-Le! Viva Chile, Chile!" was the catchy refrain that rang out across stadiums and streets last summer—although it was winter there—up and down the long, thin South American country.

A place that starts with hot desert and ends with snow-capped mountains, a country of contrasts but united in backing their team to triumph in the Copa America.

Everybody was convinced, from the fans that wielded a gigantic Chile flag at every game—which took several people to carry it into the stadium—to the taxi drivers who spoke about “when” La Roja would lift the trophy, not if.

Even the smog that sat over Santiago and grew thicker and heavier the further south you went wasn’t enough to upset people. The capital was on “environmental alert” on various occasions during the tournament, with cars without specific catalytic converters banned from entering certain zones, but the football carried on, and so did Chile.

They sailed through the group, overcoming Uruguay and Peru in the knockout rounds and then beating Argentina on penalties in the final. “After 99 years, it came down to 12 yards,” wrote Jonathan Wilson in The Blizzard magazine, referring to Chile’s first tournament win since the competition’s inception.

It felt natural, like the end of a cycle, and it proved to be. The next day rain fell in Santiago for the first time in several months, helping to clear the smog. It was meant to be. Of course, everything had been in their favour from the start.

Argentina and Brazil—not that the Selecao were much good—were in the other half of the draw, it was on home soil, there was some dubious refereeing and several red card decisions went their way, none of the Copa’s other traditional powers were at their strongest.

That said, though, they were also the best team and deserved to end their cup drought. Jorge Sampaoli managed them superbly, his side playing with increasing maturity as the tournament progressed. He went on to be named one of the top three managers of the year by FIFA, before his relationship with Chile’s football federation (ANFP) ruptured.

Sampaoli said he was upset after his contract details were exposed in the press and ended up buying his way out of his deal in January after several weeks of arguing and negotiations, per the Press Association (h/t Daily Mail).

The Chilean football governing body released a statement, as reported by Reuters, reading:

As part of the deal, Jorge Sampaoli's severance pay will be paid, including vacation days, salary for the month of January, and the awards owed to him for the last qualifying matches.

For his part, the ex-coach signed an IOU and agreed to pay a fee to the ANFP... and agreed to renounce the totality of his bonuses for the 2015 Copa America tournament.

However, despite Sampaoli’s claim, there is a decent argument to think that the coach merely wanted a way out after taking the “golden generation” to its natural peak. Repeating Copa America success at the Centenario tournament in the United States would be extremely hard.

Without the hordes of fans roaring the team on, without the buzz and emotion of the home tournament, not to mention a squad that had encountered glory that would not taste as sweet the second time, managing Chile at this summer’s tournament was not a hugely attractive option.

Less attractive still would be taking them to Russia for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. The key players would be hitting 30 or past it, and La Roja would arrive with a level of expectation that it will not be able to sate. Particularly playing under Sampaoli, a disciple of Marcelo Bielsa, who demands a helter-skelter, high-energy pressing strategy from his team.

Despite it being a difficult job to take—Sampaoli’s team’s exploits will live long in the memory for Chileans, from their fiery World Cup displays in 2014 to Copa America glory—Juan Antonio Pizzi stepped forward. Another Argentinian. 

According to World Soccer's Tim Vickery, several managers had turned down the job beforehand. A poisoned chalice.

Pizzi’s first game was against the country of his birth—although it should be noted he actually played for Spain in the 1990s—but he could not repeat Sampaoli’s feat at the same stadium, Estadio Nacional, eight months on.

His team did deliver a thrilling game, however, which the Copa America final was not. Felipe Gutierrez’s opener made for a perfect start for Pizzi, but goals from Angel Di Maria and Gabriel Mercado saw Argentina emerge 2-1 winners.

Unfortunately for the coach, Argentina’s equaliser came when defensive midfield shield Marcelo Diaz was off injured. However, Chile started flowing in the next game, a 4-1 win away against Venezuela, with Arturo Vidal and Mauricio Pinilla both netting twice.

Chile will face Argentina again in the group stage of this tournament, along with Bolivia, whom they beat in the first phase last year, and Panama.

The Copa America Centenario was always going to lead to a tough decision for Pizzi. Blood youngsters, including some who helped Chile reach the quarter-finals of the 2013 U20 World Cup, or stick with the first team? To compete at Russia 2018, some of the "kids" need to be brought through.

Three made the final squad in Erick Pulgar (22), Enzo Roco (23) and Nicolas Castillo (23), and the latter may get the chance to shine up front if anything should befall Pinilla.

Roco, who played at Espanyol in La Liga this season, is the tallest player in the squad at 1.92m, which could earn him a spot in defence—Sampaoli’s favoured pairing of Gary Medel and Gonzalo Jara didn’t boast much height.

For the most part, though, it’s the tried and trusted troops, with one boost being the return of Charles Aranguiz, who was exceptional last year but spent most of the season injured at Bayer Leverkusen.

Controversially, Jorge Valdivia was left out. The creative midfield is a unique player, albeit one who has proved troublesome in the past.

Known as "el mago," or "the magician," Valdivia is an extremely popular character both in the Chile camp and out of it. If Chile lack inspiration at times this summer, expect fingers to be pointed at Pizzi for failing to bring the 32-year-old to the States.

Valdivia’s mother has already started. "If this pig-headed Argentinian didn't call him up, it's because he didn't want to win the Copa America," she wrote on her Facebook page, according to Goal's Chilean website. "He didn't want to cause more pain to Argentina again."

According to the same source, Vidal and Medel, among others, were upset he was not included—the only player who started the final in 2015 not to make the squad.

Valdivia wrote on his Twitter account: “I will miss the national team. Thanks for your messages of love. I will support from outside, and I wish my team-mates success.

“I will keep preparing myself for when they call me, to be better than ever. Success and lots of strength to my friends and team-mates in La Roja. And the coach, too.”

At the last Copa America, there were also a couple of troublesome incidents, with Vidal crashing his Ferrari after drink-driving, per the Daily Mail, and Jara exploring Edinson Cavani’s behind a little too closely.

Pizzi may have his work cut out trying to control this group of players, particularly given neither Vidal nor Alexis Sanchez have been at their very best this season.

Alexis took six days off after a disappointing season with Arsenal before linking up with the Chile squad. Scoring 17 goals in 41 games is not bad, but injury in December hampered the forward’s season, and he went on a few long runs without finding the net.

It was Alexis’ penalty that won Chile the tournament on home soil, after captain Claudio Bravo had saved Ever Banega’s spot-kick. The Barcelona goalkeeper will feature in his fifth Copa America this summer, more than any other player in the squad.

With the team bookended by Alexis and Bravo, with Vidal in the middle and backed up by Diaz, Aranguiz, Medel and Co., ruling Chile out of contention isn’t an option. But for Pizzi, shipwreck is just as possible as success. On one hand it's a chance to apply his own methods, on the other, should anything go wrong, negative comparisons with Sampaoli won't be slow to arrive.

Jorge Sampaoli says he does not want to continue as Chile manager any more as rumours continue to circulate linking him with the Chelsea job.

The 55-year-old led the Chilean national team to Copa America glory back in the summer. He has been widely linked with the Stamford Bridge job following Jose Mourinho's recent sacking and Guus Hiddink's subsequent appointment as interim boss until the end of the season, per MailOnline's Simon Jones.

Sergio Jadue, former president of Football Federation of Chile (ANFP), resigned amid a corruption investigation in November and, as a result, Sampaoli now says he feels he is being held hostage by new president Arturo Salah, per La Tercera (via CNN Sport's Matias Grez):

"In this environment I don't want to work, or even live, in the country anymore. I thought Salah understood and would let me leave. I was surprised at his decision to hold me hostage against my will. I am frankly disappointed and in these conditions I cannot continue coaching when my mind is elsewhere."

Per beIN Sports, Salah recently revealed his intention to retain Sampaoli until the manager's contract with Chile expires in 2018.

However, it is abundantly clear that the Argentine no longer wishes to stay in the job, despite overseeing an impressive 2014 World Cup campaign before the high point of 2015's Copa America glory.

Indeed, so impressive has he been at Chile's helm that he has been nominated alongside Barcelona's Luis Enrique and Bayern Munich's Pep Guardiola for FIFA's Coach of the Year Award.

Despite Enrique leading Barca to a treble in 2015, Squawka's Euan McTear believes Sampaoli is more worthy of the award:

Jorge Sampaoli must win FIFA Coach of the Year, says @emctear. Here's why - https://t.co/SDAF85xWX0 pic.twitter.com/mdNX1UG7gM

— Squawka (@Squawka) January 10, 2016

He certainly has a good case and it is unsurprising that he should be linked with the Blues job.

Given that his position with Chile is now surely untenable despite Salah intentions, Sampaoli could well be a Premier League manager next season.  

Remember when those Peruvian fans tried to curse Alexis Sanchez out of luck before their match against Chile?

Well, it didn't turn out so well.

The Arsenal man was a key figure in Chile's 4-3 win over Peru in their World Cup qualifier Tuesday night, scoring a first-half brace and setting up Eduardo Vargas' second shortly after the half-time break.

Alexis Sanchez goals and assist vs Peru. pic.twitter.com/j9WCDCmQM5

— Mugais (@mugaisj) October 14, 2015

He first nicked in at the front post to slide in the team's opener, before sweeping home a team move on 44 minutes.

In between, Sanchez's vision was what levelled the scores in the 41st minute.

Alexis Sanchez's Mesut Ozil-esque assist for Chile v Peru http://t.co/hAX4X5SyQP http://t.co/mBXZRX5cT5

— 101 Great Goals (@101greatgoals) October 14, 2015

He later showed his pace to get clear of Peru's right-back to gift Vargas with a tap in.

Back to the drawing board for the home fans, then.

[Twitter]

Juventus midfielder Arturo Vidal has reached an agreement with prosecutors over his recent driving under the influence charge and will not go to trial.

Chile's star crashed his Ferrari on June 16 in Santiago during the Copa America and was arrested, per BBC Sport.

Vidal appeared before a judge on Wednesday and has been handed a two-year driving ban, while he has agreed to pay an undisclosed compensation fee to another person involved in the crash, per the Associated Press (h/t Fox Sports).

The 28-year-old also apologised for insulting the arresting policeman, while Sport Witness provided further details of the sanctions:

Vidal will also pay for sports equipment for a school near to where he crashed and conduct two motivational talks in juvenile facilities.

— Sport Witness (@Sport_Witness) July 8, 2015

Vidal issued an emotional apology in the wake of the incident, via Goal:

He was allowed to continue playing for Chile at the Copa America despite his arrest, and Vidal played a big role as La Roja won their home tournament, beating Argentina on penalties in the final.

One of the many fascinating aspects of football is the tension between individual and collective glory. The team wins, but some of its members are more important to the triumph than others. This tension was a part of Chile's historic first Copa America win.

When the final whistle blew on their semi-final, it was an obvious moment of celebration for the Chile players. They had beaten Peru 2-1 and were through to their first Copa final since 1987, within touching distance of, at last, having something to put in the trophy cabinet.

But there were no signs of joy from Alexis Sanchez. After his fine debut season at Arsenal, he was the man all Chile expected to deliver in the tournament.

Goalkeeper Claudio Bravo may have been the captain; tough defender Gary Medel, with his pit bull-like determination, may have been the one the fans could most easily relate to.

But Sanchez was the one who was going to thrill them, who would twist opposing defences inside out and get the crowd on its feet. True to his nature, Sanchez poured his heart and soul into the challenge. But try as he might, things were not quite turning out the way he expected. He was unlucky in the second game against Mexico, when a perfectly legitimate goal was ruled out for offside. In the next match, against Bolivia, he finally got onto the scoresheet, guiding a header inside the far post.

But the real stuff was the knockout games. And the quarter-final, a tense battle against Uruguay, was not his finest match. Afterward, he complained of not feeling sharp, that he had not felt the usual spring in his legs. It was hardly a surprising observation. In previous months, as he chased every ball on those Premier League grounds, there was always a fear that he might not have enough gas left in the tank when his country needed him most. But perhaps the Peru semi-final would turn out differently for him.

He had his moments. Chile's opening goal came when he cut in from the left and hit a cross-cum-shot. That can be a nightmare for the 'keeper because he has to watch the arriving runner (in this case Charles Aranguiz) and keep an eye on the trajectory of the ball—which in this case brought it back off the post to be bundled over the line by Eduardo Vargas.

But it was not his game. The headlines all belonged to Vargas, who blasted home a wonderful winner in the second half. It was his fourth goal of the tournament. Sanchez was still stuck on one. The tournament was not going the way that Sanchez had spent months dreaming and imagining it would. And so, at the end of the game, while his team-mates celebrated with the crowd, he turned his back and walked off the field.

It was an action that was noticed and criticised by the Chilean press. The next day, Jose Miguelez, sports editor of the La Tercera newspaper, wrote: "Alexis does not analyse the matches in the light of his team has done, but following the criteria of his own individual performance. It is football as interested in the first person—where 'I' is more important than 'we.' The worst thing is that his low level of performance is eating him up."

The same newspaper conducted an interview with Jose Sulantay, the coach who groomed Sanchez, Medel, Arturo Vidal and Mauricio Isla at under-20 level in 2007—they finished third in that year's U-20 World Cup in Canada, the first sign that an interesting generation was blooming in Chilean football.

"I don't think Alexis is in bad shape," said Sulantay. "But I see him as a little frustrated. He was dreaming of showing the same form that made him one of the best players in Europe last season." And, fascinatingly, Sulantay added that "his level of performance is being affected by the battle that he fights out with Arturo Vidal to be the best player in the Chile side. Vidal has scored a few goals, and Alexis wanted to score a goal from another planet to compete on the same level."

This offers an intriguing window into the complex subject of team dynamics, the contest to win a greater share of a glory that is achieved collectively.

Sulantay knows both players, had both in his starting lineup and would seem to offer a well-qualified perspective. Evidence that he is correct comes from the aftermath of the incident earlier in the tournament when Vidal crashed his Ferrari in a drink-driving accident. The following morning, there was speculation that the player might be axed from the squad. Coach Jorge Sampaoli was adamant Vidal was staying, though.

When Sampaoli held a press conference to explain his decision, Sanchez made a point of being alongside him.

"I asked to come here to clear things up and draw a line under the subject," said Sanchez. "There have been no internal fights, no one wants him to be thrown out of the squad, all the players are right behind him. And I said to him, 'you've really got to tear it up on the pitch.' I'm sure that he'll do it."

This, then, was Sanchez the leader, Sanchez speaking on behalf of the group, Sanchez offering support but also demanding sacrifice from his troubled team-mate—and, in a sense, perhaps his rival as well.

There is nothing intrinsically wrong in this type of dual relationship. One of the big secrets of The Beatles, for example, was the fact that John Lennon and Paul McCartney were simultaneously co-operating and competing. It is only a problem if individuals in the same collective start singing from different song sheets, if the competition becomes stronger than the co-operation.

In the case of Chile, there was just that flicker of danger, that moment at the end of the semi-final when Sanchez did not seem to be in harmony with his team-mates. It is, though, easier to keep people in line for the short duration of a tournament. After all, a shot at glory was just five days away.

But the final, too, was not his game. After all the hopes, it was a disappointing affair for the star attacking players on both sides, a 0-0 draw that occasionally spluttered but failed to spark. The 120 minutes were for more prosaic virtues—the strongest candidate for man of the match was Charles Aranguiz, the motor of the Chile midfield, a quiet, admirably versatile runner rather than a footballing thoroughbred.

Sanchez had a couple of big moments—in the second half, he met a fine Aranguiz chipped pass with a volley on the swivel that went narrowly wide of the far post. And he had the best opportunity of extra time, charging away down the right channel on a counter-attack, but under pressure from Pablo Zabaleta, he sent his shot over the bar.

Once again, he had not been able to tip the balance. But then came the penalty shootout. And as destiny would have it, the chance to clinch the title fell to Chile's No. 7. There is no way this could have been scripted. Sanchez was the fourth Chilean to step up. Usually, it is the fifth man facing the all-or-nothing situation. But Chile had scored from all three of their kicks, while two Argentinians had missed. If Sanchez scored, the Copa was Chile's.

It was not a make-or-break moment in the shootout—Sanchez could miss and the fifth Chilean would still have another go at clinching things—but it was a huge moment for Sanchez.

A year earlier, he had missed in the shootout against Brazil in the second round of the World Cup. Chile lost that day, but Sanchez had played well and scored. This time, he had not lived up to expectations. Another miss, then, would have an effect on his reputation in the eyes of his countrymen.

This was not the time for a great player to play safe, to be happy with half measures. It was the time for something dramatic, for Sanchez to make a statement of his own worth. And so he duelled with the eyes of Argentina 'keeper Sergio Romero, saw that Romero was committed to diving left and dinked a subtle little shot down the middle, a lovely artistic touch to seal the title.

In the post-match press conference, Sampaoli said that Sanchez had not practiced that kind of penalty in training. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing, the response of a wonderfully talented footballer to the drama of circumstances when something mundane would not be good enough.

And it provided Alexis Sanchez with a wonderful moment of revenge or redemption for the frustrations he went through during the tournament. Whenever clips of Chile's first title are played—as they will be constantly on TV in his homeland—the fact that he fell short of expectations in the 2015 Copa will be forgotten. But the moment when he made sure of victory with his subtle little penalty will be remembered time and time again.

Tim Vickery has been covering Copa America on location in Chile. All quotes translated by the author unless otherwise noted.

ESTADIO NACIONAL, SANTIAGO — You would never have guessed 99 years of history were weighing down on Alexis Sanchez's shoulders as he cheekily dinked the winning penalty past Sergio Romero.

La Roja's star man was ice cool, dispatching Chile's fourth spot-kick of the shootout into the net, putting his side 4-1 up, a winning margin, after 120 goalless minutes.

After playing poorly against both Uruguay and Peru in the quarter-finals and semi-finals respectively, there were worries about how effective the Arsenal man was going to be in the final.

He played 52 games in a long season with Arsenal and netted 25 goals. The last of these helped his team win the FA Cup, with Sanchez only enjoying a short rest before being whisked away to his homeland.

Attacking the group stage with panache, Sanchez scored one but inspired his team to put nine more past Ecuador, Mexico and Bolivia. His form dried up thereafter, and tiredness seemed to set in.

Against Uruguay, he wondered why he wasn't playing well, saying his team-mates questioned him about it too.

His efforts against Peru were even worse, although he did create the first goal with a low cross that hit the post.

Sanchez looked upset with himself after that game, a far cry from the mile-wide smile across his face as he celebrated his winning penalty in the final.

With five days to recover and rebuild, Sanchez came into the final looking fresh and was a thorn in Argentina's side from the word go.

He nearly made the difference twice, once after turning to strike a volley wide of Sergio Romero's left post—a perfect connection but fractionally off target.

The second time was in extra time when he barged past former Barcelona team-mate Javier Mascherano, blasting into the area but sending a searing strike narrowly over the crossbar.

He was the best player on the pitch, even if Arturo Vidal later received the Man of the Match award. Luckily, Alexis had one more chance to achieve glory.

Terrible misses by Gonzalo Higuain and Ever Banega saw Chile 3-1 up after three kicks each. When Alexis stepped up, he made no mistake.

Estadio Nacional exploded, flares lit on both sides, and the whole Chilean squad ran to one corner of the pitch to celebrate. Argentina were broken; La Roja were triumphant.

Claudio Bravo lifted the Copa America trophy, as captain, but in the hearts and minds of the public, it will be the forward who is most associated with this victory.

When the smoke from the huge firework display above the stadium clears, it will be Alexis' name written in the stars for all to see.

At Barcelona, he was always in Lionel Messi's shadow, as many players are by virtue of the Argentine's greatness, but for one evening in Santiago, Sanchez outshone his former team-mate.

Chile will never forget this—the first time they have won the Copa America—and likewise, they will never forget how they won it and who scored the winning penalty.