The warrior centre-back saved the surprise for the end. Lisandro Martinez’s conversation had been sprinkled with the word “fight” and it scarcely felt surprising, There are sleek, elegant defenders who steal in unnoticed, as though they can complete the game without a speck of dirt on them, and there are stolid, solid ones, primed to head anything away but sometimes essentially uninteresting. And then there are those such as Martinez, a charismatic scrapper whose brand of full-blooded commitment has made him a Manchester United cult hero.
But not, it transpired, a serial miscreant. His Albiceleste team-mate Cristian Romero may conform more to the image of the Argentinian centre-back, leaping recklessly where others fear to tread, almost accepting red cards as an occupational hazard. Martinez can seem no less combative, but he has managed to ally a willingness to tackle with an awareness of what he can and cannot get away with.
