Lionel Messi's Copa America went from bad to worse this evening as he was sent off in Argentina 's third-place play-off with Chile.
The Barcelona star - who launched a blistering attack on the competition's officials after his side's defeat to Brazil dubbing them "bulls**t" - saw red just 38 minutes into the match in Sao Paolo.
Argentina were 2-0 up when Messi received his marching orders in the first half after clashing with Chile's Gary Medel, dubbed the Pitbull, who was also shown a straight red.
Television replays appeared to show Messi doing little wrong.
The Argentinian gave Medel a little nudge before the pair squared up face-to-face before team-mates and the referee got involved.
Goals from Sergio Aguero and Paulo Dybala gave Argentina a comfortable lead before the incident and they managed to hold out to win the game 2-1.
Messi's red card comes juts days after he slaughtered officials after his side's 2-0 defeat to Brazil.
Messi slammed afterwards: "They were not better than us. They found the net early and the second goal came from a penalty [to Aguero] they didn't award.
"They [the officials] had called a lot of bulls**t, but they didn't even check the VAR, that's unbelievable.
"That happened all over the game. At the first glance of contact, they ruled in their [Brazil's] favour and this kind of bulls**t distracted us from the game.
“Throughout the tournament they called bulls**t handballs, bulls**t penalties, and bulls**t fouls. But somehow today, they refused to use VAR.
"There is no excuses for us, but we need to review this, analyse it and let's hope CONMEBOL does something about it - but surely not, because Brazil commands too much power in the organisation.
"I spoke to the referee and he said he would respect us that he would look after us but at no moment did I see that.
"I think we played a great game. We made a great effort and they were not superior to us."
