From Lyon, where Nicolás Tagliafico has spent the past four seasons, the Argentina left-back has been looking back towards the domestic game that formed him with growing unease. Nearly a decade into his European career, the 34-year-old World Cup winner says the shifting shape of Argentine competitions has weakened the attachment he once felt to football at home.
Speaking on the programme Clank!, Tagliafico said he now watches little Argentine football, partly because of the kick-off times from France but also because he believes the standard and structure of the national competitions have deteriorated. He grew up with the old Apertura and Clausura format, featuring 20 clubs, and said today’s split groups can be difficult to follow.
“I have gradually lost some of that love for Argentine football,” he said. “I do not know whether it is because I feel the quality has dropped, or because I was raised with Apertura and Clausura tournaments and 20 teams. Now you see Group A and Group B and do not understand how everything fits together.”
A return remains possible, but not yet appealing
Tagliafico’s frustration is directed especially at the frequent redesign of competitions. In Europe, he said, the systems around the game have largely remained stable during his time abroad. Argentina, by contrast, has offered formats in which winners of separate cups meet one another, arrangements he feels can dilute the sense that a club must battle through an entire campaign to earn a title.
He left Argentina in 2018, moving from Independiente to Ajax after beginning his professional path at Banfield. Since 2022 he has played for Lyon, where his contract runs until June 2027. A return across the Atlantic has not been ruled out, but he said no project has yet persuaded him that the time is right.
“I am keeping the door open,” Tagliafico said. “I have never said I would not go back because I do not know what will happen. It depends on the projects in Argentina, the club and how things are run. If I return, it would be to help the club, but at the moment I do not have that motivation.”
Part of Argentina’s winning generation
Whatever his reservations about the domestic landscape, Tagliafico remains firmly part of the Argentina side shaped under Lionel Scaloni. He started the 2022 World Cup final against France in Qatar and was also involved in the Copa América triumphs of 2021 and 2024.
Still selected for the national team, he belongs to a generation that has carried Argentina through its most successful modern period. Yet his comments offer a more complicated view from abroad: pride in the shirt, and in the country’s footballing tradition, alongside concern that the club game needs a clearer and more settled direction before it can tempt him home.
