Thursday, December 1, 2022 – 1:17 am
Doha, November 30, WAM, The Argentine national football team qualified for the second round (round of 16) of the 2022 World Cup, with a precious 2-0 victory over its Polish counterpart today, in the third round of Group C matches in the first round of the tournament.
The Polish national team accompanied its Argentine counterpart to the second round, after securing second place in the group, on goal difference only, against the Mexican national team, which defeated its Saudi counterpart 2-1 in the second match in the group, but left the tournament in the first round.
The Argentine national team topped the group with 6 points, by two points in front of the Polish and Mexican teams, while the Saudi national team’s balance was frozen at 3 points.
The Argentine national team will meet its Australian counterpart in the round of 16 of the World Cup, after the latter ranked second in Group D, while the Polish national team will meet its French counterpart, the world champion and the leader of Group D.
With the qualification of the Argentine and Polish teams, the number of qualified teams rose to the second round to 10, after the qualification of France, Brazil, Portugal, the Netherlands, Senegal, England and the United States.
The first half of the Argentina-Poland match ended in a goalless draw, after the famous star Lionel Messi, captain of the Argentine national team, missed a penalty kick in the 39th minute.
It became the second penalty kick missed by Messi in the history of his participation in the World Cup tournaments, where he previously missed a penalty kick also against Iceland in the group stage of the 2018 World Cup in Russia, noting that Messi paid only 3 penalty kicks throughout his history in the World Cup, where the other kick was successful and scored it in the net of the national team Saudi Arabia in the current version.
Messi alone held the record for the number of matches played by any Argentine player in the World Cup tournaments, as he raised his tally to 22 matches, surpassing the late legend Diego Maradona, who held the record until the start of the current World Cup with 21 matches.
Polish goalkeeper Vujic Chesney saved the second penalty kick in the current World Cup, as he saved in his team’s last match against the Saudi national team the penalty kick taken by Salem Al-Dosari.
In the second half, Alexis McAlister and Julian Alvarez scored two goals for the Argentine national team in the 46th and 67th minutes.
In the second match in the group, the first half between Saudi Arabia and Mexico ended in a goalless draw as well.
In the second half, the Mexican national team scored two consecutive goals scored by Henri Martin and Luis Chavez in the 47th and 52nd minutes, while Salem Al-Dosari scored the Saudi national team goal in the fifth minute of stoppage time.
Emad Al-Ali / Ahmed Zahran