‘What are you looking at, fool’: Messi’s words being printed as merchandise

Just as he has throughout this World Cup, Lionel Messi made the headlines in Argentina’s quarterfinal against the Netherlands. But not just for his on field performance that included a freak of an assist, a goal from spot kick and then another successful spot kick during the shootout. Post match Messi would have a run-in with Wout Weghorst, scorer of both Dutch goals to get them back into the game, during the former’s interview with TyC Sports.

“What are you looking at, fool? Go away,” Messi was quoted as saying by the television channel. A quote that has already becoming part of the football pop culture with coffee mugs and T-shirts being printed with the original quote in Spanish, “Qué mirás, bobo? Qué mirás, bobo?… Andá para allá”.

Mercado Libre, an Argentine merc store headquartered in Uruguay, has already added a variety of the merchandises with the phrase on its online store.

With a contrast of font style, colors and illustrations of Messi and the Argentina flag, the store has mugs ranging between $1.500 to $3.000, while the t-shirts prices as far up as $3.800.

Messi was seen indulging in multiple exchanges with Weghorst as well as the Dutch manager Louis Van Gaal after their 3-4 win on penalties in the quarterfinal.

Talking about the confrontation after the match, the Argentina captain had said, “I don't like to talk before the games. Since he entered the game, he began to provoke us, bump into us, tell us things… It seems to me that this is not part of football. I always respect everyone, I like that they respect me too. Their coach was not respectful to us. We suffer too unfairly. Van Gaal sells that he plays football and then puts tall people in and began to hit balls.”

The match ended up being one of the most intensely contested fixtures at this World Cup with Referee Mateu Lahoz ended up brandishing a total of 17 yellow cards to players and staff, without sending any player off. A World Cup record.