The Lionel Messi-led Argentina team will visit India in November to play an international football friendly match in Kerala.
The Argentine Football Association (AFA) confirmed the development on Friday (Saturday in India) while releasing La Albiceleste’s tentative schedule for friendly matches in the upcoming FIFA windows this year.
The November fixtures will be part of three matches scheduled during the FIFA international window, with the other two games to be played in the US and Luanda, Angola.
“The Argentine national team, led by Lionel Scaloni, will have two FIFA friendlies in the remainder of 2025. The first, in October, from the 6th to the 14th, will be played in the United States (opponents and cities to be determined). The second, a FIFA friendly in November, from the 10th to the 18th, will be played in Luanda, Angola, and Kerala, India (opponents to be determined),” the AFA statement reads.
This will mark Messi and the Argentina men’s football team’s first visit to India since 2011, when they faced Venezuela in a friendly at the Salt Lake Stadium in Kolkata.
The AFA statement has put paid to a PTI report earlier in August that Messi would travel to Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Mumbai and New Delhi, culminating in a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The Reports suggested at the time that there will be no stop in Kerala.
