Herbal drink helped Argentina, Lionel Messi in Qatar WC: Report

Lionel Messi-led Argentina is in the final of the FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar. And, there is a drink that has “helped” the players to reach the summit clash.

After a shock defeat to Saudi Arabia 2-1 in its opening group-stage game, Argentina bounced back brilliantly.

An herbal drink is aiding Argentine players to perform better on the field in Middle East’s first-ever football World Cup.

Also read: Full coverage of FIFA World Cup 2022

According to a report in New York Times (NYT), Argentina footballers in Qatar are benefiting from yerba mate, a strong and often bitter herbal drink brewed hot or cold from the leaves of a plant native to South America.

Yerba mate is popular in Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina. Some of the best football players in the world hail from that region and swear by it, and they have spread it around the world through their club teams, the report said.

Brazil’s team brought 26 pounds of yerba mate to Qatar, a team official said. Uruguay’s squad packed about 530 pounds. But it was Argentina that topped them all. To ensure that the roughly 75 members of its traveling party — players, coaches, trainers and the rest — would have a steady supply of a drink they consider essential, Argentina’s team hauled a whopping 1,100 pounds of yerba mate to Qatar, as per the report.

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“It has caffeine,” Argentine midfielder Alexis Mac Allister said in Spanish while explaining why he consumed so much of the drink that some have likened to a stronger green tea. “But I drink it more than anything to bring us together.”

A spokesman for Argentina’s national team, Nicolas Novello, was quoted as saying by NYT that the team brought different types to suit everyone’s taste: yerba mate with stems (a milder taste), without stems (a stronger, more bitter taste) and with herbs (for other flavors). Observers said nearly everyone, including the team’s star, Lionel Messi, was drinking it; the team’s devotion to the drink was clear every time it unloaded its team bus, and after matches, a handful of players would carry out the traditional mate essentials: a cup made of a hollow gourd, its accompanying straw and a thermos of hot water.

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Argentina midfielder Alexis MacAllister, who is a part of the World Cup squad in Qatar, told The Times: “I drink it more than anything to bring us together.”

MacAllister’s teammate Sebastian Driussi told publication: “It’s like water for us. Before a game, in the locker room, everyone is drinking it all the time.”

According to a report on Eurosport few years back, Argentina is, quite simply, the world’s leading consumer and exporter of mate. Since 2010, the “Ruta del Mate” (the Mate route) is considered as cultural heritage in the country of Lionel Messi, who is one of the best ambassadors of this drink that he himself consumes. The route includes several visits enabling the public at large to follow the mate creation process before it arrives in the footballers’ gourds.

There are other players who drink mate and one of them is France’s Antoine Griezmann, who will play in the FIFA World Cup 2022 semi-final against Morocco tonight (12:30 AM IST, December 15).

“It is a completely natural product that has entered the daily lives of certain players,” Griezmann had said in 2016.