'Louis van Gaal needs to keep his mouth shut'

Argentina's goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez has lashed out at Louis van Gaal after the Albiceleste defeated Netherlands in their quarterfinal clash on Friday.

Martinez was one of the heroes for Argentina as they edged past the Dutch on penalties to setup a clash with Croatia in the final four round.

The quarterfinal looked like it was going in Argentina's favour for most of the time before Wout Weghorst's brace got the Dutch back in the game.

Martinez saved Virgil van Dijk and Steven Berghuis' penalties in the shootout to hand Argentina the win. The match had many flashing points as both sets of players clashed on the pitch on Friday.

The Argentina goalkeeper, as quoted by the Independent, also hit out at Van Gaal for his pre-match comments and said that he should keep his mouth shut.

"I heard Van Gaal saying, 'We've got an advantage in penalties. If we go to penalties we win.'

"I think he needs to keep his mouth shut."

Martinez also had some choice words reserved for the referee on Friday, Mateu Lahoz, after the game and said that he was useless and hoped that they will not have the Spanish official in any of their future matches.

"It was a tricky game," Martinez told beIN Sports.

"I thought we controlled the game really well. We went 2-0 up, basically we controlled the game. The ref was just giving everything for them.

"He gave 10 minutes (stoppage time) for no reason. He was giving free-kicks outside the box for them, like two, three times.

"He just wanted them to score, that's basically it. So, hopefully we don't have that ref anymore. He's useless."

Messi also lashed out at the referee for his officiating of the match saying that FIFA can't put someone like Lahoz for a big game like the one on Friday.

"I don't want to talk about the referee because you can't be honest. If you talk they sanction you, FIFA must think about it, they can't put a referee like that for these instances, they can't put a referee who isn't up to the task," said Messi