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Chile Wins Copa America Tournament, Messi Quits National Team

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Chile's Edson Puch holds the championship trophy after the Copa America Centenario championship soccer match, Sunday, June 26, 2016.
Chile's Edson Puch holds the championship trophy after the Copa America Centenario championship soccer match, Sunday, June 26, 2016.

Chile's Francisco Silva sent his penalty kick into the lower left corner of the net as Argentina keeper Sergio Romero dove the opposite way, giving Chile its second straight Copa America football tournament championship.

The two teams had played to a 0-0 draw Sunday in front of more than 82,000 soccer fans in East Rutherford, New Jersey. This year's tournament was a special edition honoring the one hundredth year of Copa America and featured an expanded field of 16 teams from North and South America.

Sunday's game was a rematch of last year's Copa America final, which also went to penalty kicks after a scoreless regulation and extra time.

Argentina sent reigning world player of the year Lionel Messi to take its first penalty kick, but after sailing his shot over the crossbar he could only tug at his jersey in disbelief. The next two Argentina players made theirs, but that was not enough to overcome Chile, which put four penalty kicks in the net to win.

Messi announced not long after the loss he was quitting the national team.He told the Argentine network TyC Sports "the national team is over for me. It's been four finals, it's not meant for me. I tried. It was the thing I wanted the most, but I couldn't get it, so I think it's over.''

The 29-year-old Messi has led Barcelona to four Champions League titles.

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