Photo credit: Courtesy of Sports Vision
It was a game that everyone thought Argentina would win, and indeed there was a gap between the two teams. After their success in the third group game, Argentina continued to play Enzo Fernández at the back, paired with De Paul, and then Mac Allister in the center of the field, while up front they took away DiMaria, and paired Papu Gomez with Alvarez and Messi. Alvarez was paired with Messi.
(Both teams start)
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Alvarez started the game aggressively, while Messi backed off a bit and prepared to hold the ball. Argentina attacked more aggressively in this game, with De Paul pressing forward, Molina on the right also taking turns to press forward, and Acuña on the left also moving up to the center of the field, pushing Mac Allister forward again, which put Australia under a lot of pressure.
But once Australia had consolidated their backline to four, it was actually difficult for the Argentine side to attack, and there weren't enough numbers in the middle to move up and squeeze back into the line, so the front four looked isolated.
Australia started to play long passes, their formation is quite open, the middle of the road as much as possible to Mooy to send the ball, they have been playing the left side, Behich and Irvine is quite active, Argentina because the right side of the pressure is very far forward, so there is really space deep in the route to play long passes, only Mooy and others are limited in the ability to play long passes, a lot of times the long passes are too big, and the side to go up It's not a good idea to go up to the side.
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Argentina's feeling was that they couldn't attack, and it was quite hard for them to press Australia physically. On the whole, this attacking combination didn't have the effect of passing and controlling the opponents, and couldn't produce any effective shots on goal, which was actually not a successful formation and tactics. However, at 34:00, Messi played a set-piece from the right side of the field, and it was Argentina who took the ball after it was headed out, and Messi moved to the penalty area line to receive it. Mac Allister passed the ball to Otamendi in the penalty area, Otamendi pushed the ball to the side, Messi came up to take the ball and kicked it through the defender's crotch to break the goal, which was totally unexpected by the goalkeeper Ryan, and Argentina scored the first point.
In order to grab points after the fall, Australia began to play high press, and Argentina's back line is really not very stable, especially the back waist is not enough to come back to meet the range, often the back line is directly under pressure, forced to directly have to clear the ball, so the ball will be in the form of air ball to the center of the field, Australia will be able to use their physical advantage to play with Argentina in the air ball, it can be said that this approach is quite good, it is the key to the stalemate with Argentina. This was the key to the stalemate with Argentina.
At the start of the second half, Australia continued to press high up the pitch and lengthen the line, Argentina made a substitution at 49:00, Linsadro Martinez came on for PapuGomez, who hadn't been very effective, and the formation changed, with Lisandro Martinez still playing on the left side of the field, and pushing Acuña into the center of the field, because he had given Australia a hard time with several attacks in the first half, and Lisandro Martinez did play more consistently. As he had given Australia a bit of a hard time in the first half, and Lisandro Martinez did play more consistently out of the back.
After Acuña came on, it really helped the team's overall advancement, although his cooperation with Mac Allister could only hit the side of the road and couldn't form an inside cut or cross, but Australia was already very nervous, and at this time Argentina could already free up Alvarez to harass the center back and the goalkeeper, in fact, it can be clearly seen that Australia's backfield passes after the 50th minute was really nervous, because In fact, you can clearly see that Australia was really nervous after 50 minutes, because the passes from Acuña and Mac Allister were almost impossible to get out, and even if they did, there was still Lisandro Martinez on the other side. When the passes were only on one side, it was easier for Argentina to predict them, and so it put a lot of pressure on Australia's backfield personnel to worry about being intercepted.
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When the Australian goalkeeper received a pass back at 57:00, a chasing De Paul didn't stop and went straight back up to press the goalkeeper again, causing him to miss the kick, which was stolen straight into the goal by Alvarez to make it 2-0 for Argentina easily.
Australia kept changing players to strengthen the pressure and counterattack, but Argentina also replaced Acuña and Alvarez, two important players who had played well, and replaced Tagliafico and Lautaro Martinez to start counterattacking directly, and then the two teams were deadlocked, but with Australia constantly rushing up to the attack, the last 77 minutes, by the replacement of Goodwin took a shot from outside the box after a teammate's cross was deflected out of the box. Enzo Fernández tried to block the shot, but it was deflected into his own goal, making it 2-1 in favor of Argentina.
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Although Argentina won against Australia, many problems have emerged. Enzo Fernández played at the back and did have good ball control, and De Paul was also liberated to a certain extent because the pressure at the back became smaller, he did not have to keep retreating and could even press very far forward, but in the face of Australia's intensive defense, Argentina's destructive power in front of the field was not enough, and what was really effective was the left side of the field where Acuña and Mac Allister played, but only in terms of pressure and could not yet create a shot or a chance to grab a goal. The real effective is Acuña, Mac Allister this side of the left side, but only the pressure but not yet able to create a shot or grab a chance, and in the Australian forced pressure and the situation of the long line, Argentina does not have a full-time back to cover the back line in front of the body (Paredes is not in good shape), resulting in the ball into only clear the ball is also a problem, in fact, Argentina is still relying on this game. In fact, Argentina's game still relies on Messi's magic shot to open up the field first, forcing Australia to come out to attack, and then have the space to force Australia to make mistakes, which will definitely be magnified in the battles to come.
