Argentina cruised to top spot of Group C following a 2-0 win against Poland in Stadium 974.
This was the performance that Argentinian fans had expected prior to the tournament as they dominated Poland from start to finish with Lionel Messi dictating the play.
Messi missed a penalty in the first half. Wojciech Szczesny stretched to his left to palm the penalty away, but it would not be a costly miss for Argentina.
While all eyes were on Messi and Robert Lewandowski, it was two reasonable newcomers to the Argentina squad that got the goals.
Brighton’s Alex Mac Allister scored his first Argentina goal straight after half time, directing Nahul Molina’s cross into the bottom left hand corner. In the 68th minute Julian Alvarez scored his first World Cup goal. Enzo Feranandez found Alvarez in the box who curled a shot in to the top right hand corner.
It became a matter of how many more goals Argentina could score. They peppered Poland’s goal in the second half with the Europeans in danger of being eliminated. Poland held out to earn second place in the group.
Argentina now moves on to face Australia in the round of 16 with the disastrous start against Saudi Arabia a distant memory.
