Kolkata, Sep 3: If it was Lionel Messi magic inside the Yuba Bharati Krirangan on Friday evening, outside of it there was a big traffic mess forcing many spectators to arrive late after the match kicked off at 7.10pm.

With all the roads in the football-crazy city leading to the stadium, long traffic snare could be seen along the Eastern Metropolitan Bypass on which the 120,000 capacity Salt Lake stadium is located.

Even as the district police along with the city police were working in tandem, the traffic mismanagement led to a lot of chaos as the EM Bypass on the periphery of the stadium turned into choc-a-block.

Many frustrated fans gave up and began to walk along the long stretch and it took time for the spectators to trickle into the stadium.

About 70,000 spectators could be seen in the three tiers of the 120,000 capacity stadium as the match kicked off.

The rain in the afternoon made it all the more difficult apart from the traffic chaos as vehicles took time to move along the road.

The stadium was swarmed with police personnel and private agency people as foolproof security measures were put in place for the high profile FIFA international friendly between Argentina and Venezuela.

A three layer security arrangement was in place in the stadium with 5,000 armed police personnel being deployed.

PTI