Argentina World Cup 2018
Two-time world champions Argentina will be hoping to go one better than in the last World Cup, when they finished runners-up. What are the chances for Argentina?
History at the World Cup
Argentina have a rich World Cup history, having been crowned world champions twice and reaching the final on three other occasions. Their best period came between 1978 and 1990, when they were champions twice and losing finalists once. Since losing in the 1990 final, they had a period where they couldn’t get past the Quarter Final. In five finals tournaments, they reached the last eight three times, the last 16 once, and exited at the group stage in the other.
However, they made it past the Quarter Final in Brazil 2014 and went within a whisker of lifting the trophy, but Germany pipped them to it after extra time. Going as far as the final in that tournament will give them the belief that they can go all the way this time around.
- World Cup Finals Appearances – 16
- Previous Best Performance – Winners (twice)
How they qualified
The CONMEBOL qualifying group got off to a poor start for Argentina, losing to Ecuador in the opening match before picking up draws with Paraguay and Brazil.
They picked up their first victory of the campaign in match four, which was the start of a four-match winning streak and six-match unbeaten run. Defeat to Paraguay started a run of just two victories in eight matches, leaving them clinging on to the hope of securing an automatic qualifying position.
Step forward Lionel Messi, who netted a hat-trick to give his country a 3-1 win over Ecuador which shot them up to third spot as other results also went their way.
Coach/Manager
Jorge Sampaoli took over as Argentina head coach in June 2017, and oversaw a four-match unbeaten run to end the qualifying campaign and secure their spot in Russia.
This is his second managerial job in international football, as he previously had a four-year spell in-charge of Chile.
Under Sampaoli’s management, Chile won the 2015 Copa America and the manager himself was shortlisted for the prestigious FIFA World Coach of the Year.
A short spell at Sevilla followed his resignation from the Chile position in 2016, and he now gets the chance to lead the country of his birth to a World Cup finals tournament.
Star Players
When it comes to star players, there’s one who stands out from the crowd despite only being 5ft 7in.
That man is Lionel Messi, the supremely gifted, goal scoring machine who many believe is the best player to ever step foot on a football pitch.
Messi has broken every record there ever was, basically tearing the record books up and creating his own.
He is Argentina’s record scorer, with 61 at the time of writing this. He also has a phenomenal scoring record at club level, netting more than forty goals a season since 2009/10. This term, he has already scored almost twenty and there is still more than half the season left to play.
Other stand-out players for Argentina are; Javier Mascherano, who has earned 141 caps to date, Angel di Maria, the PSG forward with fantastic ability and who can turn a match with one piece of trickery, and Sergio Aguero of Manchester City.
Argentina World Cup 2018: Assessing their Chances & Odds
The bookmakers have Argentina priced as fifth favourites, at odds of around 9/1, and we think those are fantastic odds for a team with such attacking prowess.
Messi, Di Maria, Aguero and co. have the capabilities of absolutely dominating any opposition put in front of them, and that makes them an extremely dangerous team.
Drawn in a group with Nigeria, Iceland, and Croatia, they should be going through as group winners with relative ease. The bookies have them priced as 8/13 favourites to top the group and that’s exactly what we think they will do.
That should set up a last 16 fixture against the runners-up of Group C, and that should be another victory for them.
The Quarter Final could see them take on either Spain and Portugal, leading to a potential Semi Final against Germany, England, or Belgium, and then a probable final with Brazil.
Our Argentina World Cup 2018 Prediction
Argentina are one of our tips to do well in this World Cup and we believe they can go all the way to the final, and possibly win the entire tournament. They struggled at times during qualification but that is in the past now, and a Messi inspired team with a fantastic supporting cast are too good to make the same mistakes again. We aren’t going to tip them as winners just yet, but we are confident that Argentina will reach at least the Quarter Final.