Martinez broke the deadlock in the 19th minute off a pass from Mac Allister, a shot from just outside the box. Ten minutes after that, Paz made it 2-0, chipping the keeper after Palacios played him through one-on-one. Halftime score, 2-0, and honestly Argentina never looked like they'd let this one slip.
Second half, same story. Paz swung in a corner eight minutes after the restart and Romero rose above everyone to head it home. 3-0. Then, late, substitute Jose Manuel Lopez grabbed a rebound in the 86th minute for his first senior goal with the national team. Final score: 4-0.
Bolivia barely showed up offensively. Argentina had 18 shots to their three, and controlled the ball close to 70 percent of the night.
Photo: Vavel.com
Here's a detail that got almost as much attention as the goals. Cristian Romero captained Argentina for the first time Wednesday. Local radio station Cadena 3 mentioned the crowd gave him a proper ovation for it, which says something about how much weight that armband carries right now.
A guy scoring in his first game as captain tends to be the kind of thing people remember later, whether it means anything long-term or not
He wasn't on the pitch, obviously, but good luck finding a conversation about this match that didn't mention him anyway. 207 caps, 125 goals, still Argentina's all-time leading scorer, 21 of those goals coming in World Cups. He announced his retirement just a month before this game, closing out a run that had a World Cup win in 2022 on one end and that final loss to Spain on the other.
Scaloni didn't rebuild from scratch, to be fair. Most of the World Cup final lineup was still out there Wednesday. Alvarez, Lisandro Martinez, Emiliano Martinez, Mac Allister, Palacios, all starting. Just minus the one guy who'd anchored this team for close to twenty years, and with Romero now wearing the armband instead.
This is the first of a three-game home series for Argentina, their first real stretch of games on home turf since the World Cup wrapped up. For a fanbase still a little raw from that final, it feels less like a routine international break and more like a chance to shake off the loss before whatever comes next.
Worth mentioning, Bolivia came in missing a handful of regulars. Some reports suggest their federation used this one to look at depth rather than go with a full squad. Doesn't take anything away from the scoreline, but it's context worth having.
The home series keeps going over the next few days, which gives Scaloni more time to figure out how this group functions without Messi, even in low-stakes friendlies. Nico Paz, 22 years old, with a goal and an assist on the night, looks like someone who might end up pretty central to whatever this next chapter turns into.
Bottom line, Argentina's first game without Messi didn't look like a team figuring things out. It looked like a team that already had, at least for one night in Cordoba.
Photo: Getty Images
