This is an updated version of an article first published in December 2022.

Of all the strange things you have heard about the World Cup, all the weird and wonderful stories about how this daft old sport can influence human behaviour, is there anything quite so perplexing as Bangladesh’s relationship with Argentina’s football team?

This nation of 169 million people, bordered to the north, east and west by India, has always been famous for cricket rather than football. So it isn’t always to understand why, on the streets of capital city Dhaka in particular, you might easily think you were in a neighbourhood of Buenos Aires during this World Cup.

Rows and rows of apartment blocks are festooned in Argentina’s national colours — sky blue and white. Wall murals pay homage to Diego Maradona. The Argentine national flag, the Bandera Oficial de Ceremonia, is everywhere — balconies, spires, lamp-posts. You can even get an Argentina-themed rickshaw if you fancy a ride on a seat decorated with the image of Lionel Messi.

The Athletic covered this phenomenon at the last World Cup in Qatar when millions of Bangladeshis waited up all night for the party of all parties to celebrate Messi finally getting his hands on the trophy.

“It can be crazy,” said Soumik Saheb, one of the Bangladeshis who admits having the symptoms of what appears to be a very strong dose of World Cup fever. “Every time there is an Argentina game, big screens are put up. It’s like a festival.

“There are tens of thousands of people outside and, if Argentina win, it ends each time with a rally through the streets. It’s 3am, everyone is asleep, all the shops are closed. But everyone is woken. Even the dogs who literally have nobody but themselves past midnight must be thinking, ‘Why on earth are so many people on the streets at this time?’.”

Crazy 🇦🇷 Argentina fans watch party at Feni, Bangladesh 🇧🇩 pic.twitter.com/HqjMm7Lx3W

— Md. Osman Gani ✍️⚽ (@OsmanGani89) June 20, 2026

Nor is it just a one-sided love-in. Argentina’s football federation sent one message, via X, during that tournament to thank the Bangladeshi people for their support. Some Argentine journalists started posting tweets in Bengali, as well as Spanish, so their new audience could find the latest news.

Lionel Scaloni, Argentina’s manager, was even asked about it in a news conference. “What the national team shirt transmits is crazy,” he said. “It makes us proud that the people in Bangladesh are supporting Argentina like this.”

Even more curiously, Argentina’s fans decided to do something in return. One set up a Facebook group to support Bangladesh’s national cricket team. The group was called “Fans Argentinos de la seleccion de cricket de Bangladesh” and, five days after being launched, it had 119,000 followers.

If you are struggling to understand where all this originates, perhaps it is worth remembering that Bangladesh are, without being too cruel, pretty lousy at football themselves.

Bangladesh are 181st (of 211) in FIFA’s world rankings, between Belize and Dominica, and have never got near to qualifying for a World Cup. So in the absence of football heroes of their own, the people of Bangladesh have had to find other teams to support passionately.

Traditionally, that meant Brazil, whose matches also attract huge audiences and street parades, from Dhaka to Khulna, Chattogram to Rangpur, and lots of places in between. If you don’t see Argentina’s colours decorating a street, you are likely to come across Brazil’s yellow, green and blue. Just check out the scenes when the five-time champions played Haiti in their last group game.

This is the best video I’ve seen so far from the Brazil vs Haiti watch party in Dhaka, 🇧🇩.
Just imagine what the scenes would be like if Brazil actually wins the World Cup. There’s still doubt, but the passion of Brazilian fans in 🇧🇩 is already world-class.
#brazil pic.twitter.com/NglUNBgbRq

— chill 🥂 (@Ghumacchi) June 20, 2026

More than anyone, though, one guy sways opinion, sparking mass celebrations after he announced his arrival at this summer’s tournament with a hat-trick against Algeria.

“Because we love Messi,” Shahbaj Ahmed, a Bangladeshi shopkeeper living in Qatar, told The Athletic at the last tournament. “It’s Argentina first, then Brazil, because everyone loves Messi so much.”

Ahmed ran a perfume store in Souq Waqif, among the labyrinthine shops in downtown Doha where you could buy everything from shisha pipes to spices and football shirts that, ironically, might have been made in Bangladesh. He often wore an Argentina shirt behind the counter and was at every group game during their run to the final. “I was behind the goal for the game against Australia when Messi scored. It was emotional, my favourite moment.”

It was the same at the nearby fan zone. Thousands of fans celebrated on the Corniche, the promenade stretching around Doha’s waterfront. Many were wearing Argentina shirts and waving Bangladesh flags.

Yet the origins of this devotion actually goes back further. “I’ve been watching Argentina since my childhood, even in the 2002 World Cup, when there was hardly any kind of internet,” says Saheb. “What is happening now isn’t just because of Messi, despite what many people think.”

The truth, he says, is that it been passed through various generations, gaining momentum all the time. “In the early 1980s, there were no colour televisions in Bangladesh. For a lot of people, the only way to find out about the World Cup was through the newspapers. Then the 1986 tournament came along and there was Maradona — in colour. It was the tournament of Argentina. It was the tournament of Maradona. We were hooked.”

Videos posted on the internet show thousands of Argentina fans flooding through Bangladeshi streets to celebrate. And maybe, some people believe, it helped that Maradona’s Hand of God goal 40 years ago came against England, the nation that once colonised Bangladesh. Some Bangladeshis had empathy, it is said, for Argentina over the Falklands conflict four years earlier.

All that can really be said for certain is that these guys are devoted.

MESSI FEVER TAKES OVER BANGLADESH 🇧🇩😱

Hundreds of football fans gathered in Bangladesh to watch Argentina’s World Cup debut, proving once again that Messi’s global impact reaches every corner of the planet 🏆🇦🇷🔥#LionelMessi #Argentina #WorldCup2026 #Football #Bangladesh pic.twitter.com/Fgb0xNjIRK

— MARCA in English 🇺🇸 (@MARCAinENGLISH) June 17, 2026

“These are people who wake up at 2am to watch Argentina play,” says Roy Nemer, the founder of Mundo Albiceleste, a website for Argentina supporters. “People who paint their houses in the colours of sky blue and white to show their support. It’s mind-boggling.

“There were even people in Buenos Aires who were celebrating (a group game win) by waving the flag of Bangladesh. Imagine that. Sport truly can unite different cultures and bring people together.”

Nemer can probably be forgiven for sounding slightly bemused: it takes a bit of time to get used to the idea, in his words,  that “fans from a completely different culture, who speak a completely different language, adopt a country as their own”. He also makes the point that there are other Asian countries, such as Nepal and Malaysia, where Argentina are the team of choice. It is a source of pride, he says, for the three-time World Cup winners: “There are more people in Bangladesh and India who support Argentina than there are Argentines in Argentina.”

A hairdresser’s in Doha makes its Messi allegiance clear in 2022 (Ina Fassbender/AFP via Getty Images)

The relationship is now so firmly established that El Destape, one of the media outlets in Argentina, covered a Bangladesh-India cricket international in 2021. “From Argentina, we congratulate Bangladesh for this tremendous victory,” the station cheerily announced.

One television presenter in Bangladesh read out the news in the first week of the Qatar World Cup while wearing Argentina’s team shirt. Another Bangladeshi created an Argentina flag that was — no kidding — over half a mile long. He and a small army of fellow enthusiasts paraded it through the streets of Dhaka.

When Argentina played Brazil in the 2020 Copa America final, there were reports of clashes between rival fans. Several people were injured. This was not, however, outside the Maracana, the stadium in Rio de Janeiro where the game was actually played. No, these flashpoints were in Bangladesh, 9,500 miles away.

“The police have to divide Dhaka into different areas,” explains Saheb, describing the scenes when the two giants of South American football meet. “There will be an area for the Argentina fans and another for Brazil fans. The rivalry is very strong. We are just a long way away from where the games are being played.”

On an April morning, days after being eliminated from the playoffs, Brady Tkachuk sat in the Canadian Tire Centre media lounge and addressed seeing his name in trade speculation. Again.

The American-born forward had pushed back on that kind of talk before. Then-Ottawa Senators teammates, including defenseman Thomas Chabot, had previously brushed it off as well, as did majority owner Michael Andlauer. Days earlier, Senators GM Steve Staios said any trade talk surrounding Tkachuk was “nonsense.”

Even before he opened his mouth that morning, it looked as if Tkachuk would’ve handled it the same way as always. Tkachuk even ended his press conference saluting Senators fans who stuck by him after an eventful season. It should’ve been the end of that saga. But the speculation around him didn’t stop, and some wondered if he’d still consider a change of scenery.

Sure enough, almost two months after that final media appearance of the 2025-26 season, he’s left the Senators and Canada for greener pastures in Florida. Meanwhile, his former franchise is left standing at a crossroads after a franchise-altering trade.

The Tkachuk era in Ottawa ended Sunday afternoon, smack in the middle of Father’s Day. It promises to be a day the Tkachuks will never forget. The Senators’ former captain will reunite with his brother, Matthew, as a member of the Florida Panthers after the Senators received two first-round picks in the upcoming 2026 NHL Draft, a 2027 second-round pick, and a conditional 2029 first-rounder that unconditionally slides to 2030 if it falls in the top 10.

It was the best the Senators could do after their now-former franchise winger made it clear where he wanted to play.

Around the NHL Draft Combine earlier this month, Tkachuk, who arrived as the No. 4 pick in 2018, let the Senators know he wasn’t extending his current contract, which is set to expire in summer 2028. Tkachuk possesses a full no-move clause, providing the Senators with a list of four teams he would consider joining: the Carolina Hurricanes, the Vegas Golden Knights, the Minnesota Wild and the Panthers.

The Wild, according to The Athletic’s Michael Russo, made a substantial play for Tkachuk. But at some point during negotiations, the 26-year-old made it clear he wanted to play in South Florida, and the Senators focused their attention on the Panthers.

The Sens nabbed draft capital to add to their restored No. 32 pick, giving them three first-round picks in this week’s draft. They didn’t obtain a current NHL player in return, though the expectation is that Staios will turn those draft picks into one, or maybe more, who could immediately aid their quest to be a proper contending team and return to the playoffs.

“This was not a decision we took lightly, but ultimately we did what we felt was best for the long-term future of our hockey club,” Staios said in a statement. “We now possess cap space and draft capital and will be actively working to improve our roster.”

In any case, the Senators no longer have their controversial captain. Some factions of the fan base had already mentally prepared themselves for Tkachuk’s exit. Some fell out of love with him after his gold medal celebrations at the White House. Some didn’t feel he was consistent enough during the season, and held back on his physical prowess at times. Not everyone was a fan of his outspoken “Wingmen” podcast with Matthew, either. Finally, even if Tkachuk refuted the trade speculation around him, some fans didn’t feel he did enough to quell that talk and ultimately remained skeptical that he’d re-sign in Ottawa once his contract expired.

However, when Tkachuk was on the ice, he was seen as an emotional leader capable of dragging his team into the fight. He was a physical, driven power forward who wanted to crash and bang against the league’s toughest players while also providing offence. His style of play was said to be necessary to win games in the playoffs, though he didn’t record points in four games this year against Carolina.

At the beginning of the 2025-26 regular season, it was Tkachuk who announced that expectations had been raised for his group and that making the playoffs wouldn’t be enough. In some ways, the comment proved to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, because the Senators now lack someone of his profile: a star-quality player who can go to the dirty areas and play physically when it matters most. What’s troubling is that the Senators could’ve used another forward of that ilk for their roster — even when Tkachuk was still on their team.

Tkachuk rotated between the first and second lines in Ottawa, often skating on the latter alongside center Dylan Cozens as Tim Stützle anchored the Senators’ top trio. Ottawa could use another winger with pace to play with Stützle or down with Cozens. In-season, the Sens constantly rotated through top-six left wingers, including Nick Cousins, newcomer Warren Foegele and the now-departed David Perron. A much more consistent presence would benefit the Senators long term.

Thanks to the Tkachuk trade, there’s an opportunity for the Senators to obtain that type of player, before addressing other needs such as another right-shot defenseman and a reliable backup goaltender for Linus Ullmark.

The Senators do need prospects for their pool. But standing pat on those picks with a group coming off consecutive playoff appearances, hoping for more, wouldn’t be a winning move in the eyes of their fan base and even their players. The onus, again, falls on Staios to be creatively aggressive in making up for Tkachuk’s absence. And it could call on more than internal options to make up the difference.

Some will speculate about the Senators going after Dallas Stars forward and restricted free agent Jason Robertson. However, according to The Athletic’s Chris Johnston, Robertson wouldn’t be interested in signing with Ottawa long term. There are other wingers out on the market worth looking at, including — but not limited to — Anaheim’s Mason McTavish, Vancouver’s Jake DeBrusk and St. Louis’ Jordan Kyrou.

Staios could also take the road less traveled with his newfound draft capital and cap space (the Sens have over $25 million in the latter, per PuckPedia) and consider tendering an offer sheet. This year’s restricted free-agent class is filled with star-studded talent, and Ottawa has the salary flexibility to make it worth its while. It would be an outside-the-box approach, but one can’t fault the Senators for trying, considering the offensive production they have to replace.

There’s also the unrestricted free-agent class that opens up on July 1. But the options are dwindling by the day. Even then, Staios’ roster will still have a Tkachuk-sized hole in it when the dust clears.

The Senators were right to move on from Tkachuk when they did. But they need to turn those assets into legitimate pieces that can help their group return to the playoffs. Otherwise, all the progress they built up these last few seasons, becoming a playoff team with Tkachuk at the helm, will have been for naught.