FIFA World Cup: Small margins result in Argentina’s defeat to Saudi Arabia

Argentina would curse two spells in the game. The five-minute span of madness between the 48th and 53th minutes when Saudi Arabia belted in the game-defining goals. And the 13-minute stretch from the 22nd and 35th when three ‘goals’ were adjudged offside.
In a wicked sleight, those two passages embodied the best and worst of Argentina. One illustrates the casualness in possession as well as the fleeting propensity to panic when defending around the box; the other, offside goals though they were and justifiably so, demonstrated the silk and style they possess when everything clicks, an indication of the quality they possess to rebound and salvage their tournament.

Al-Dawsari turned the game on its head with this absolute screamer! 🎯#LetItFly with @qatarairways pic.twitter.com/XoMPN1hnqH
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The build-up to the first Saudi goal originated from clumsy possession. Crian Romero, usually an indomitable defender, let Firais Al Buraikan snatch the ball from him. Romero’s weighty touch was all it took for Buraikan to gain possession and thrust a long ball into the path of Saleh-el-Shehri.

A more physically defensive approach would have averted the second Saudi goal. Two Argentines had converged into Salem-al-Dawsari, yet both were cagey. Maybe, they were the wrong players (Angel di Maria and Alejandro Gomez) for hard, bruising tackling. Dawsari was afforded space to swivel and turn.
But in the end, those were a pair of gorgeous strikes. Those were just the two shots Saudi Arabia could manage on goal in the entire game. As clinical as those strikes were, the prospect of a team scoring from their only shots on goal is rare. Agreed Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni: “It’s difficult to digest. In four-five minutes, they scored two goals, two out of two shots on goal.”
It’s equally rare that three goals are ruled offside in the space of 13 minutes. The first was when Lionel Messi hoodwinked his marker with a drop of the shoulder, opened up his body and just slipped the ball teasingly past Saudi goalkeeper Mohammed Alowais. But he had mimed his run fractionally as his right shoulder was behind the last defender’s body. Nonetheless, the pass from Leandro Paredes was delightful, with the perfect flight, weight and dip.

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Six minutes later, Lautaro Martinez lobbed a simple, straight pass from Rodrigo de Paul over the sliding goalkeeper. But like Messi, Martinez had just mimed his run. Seven minutes on, he rolled the ball into the net again, but Messi, who had conceptualised the move with a curling ball, had strayed offside. One could say that Saudi’s precarious high line performed its duties ably. But the difference between the strategy looking silly and successful was thin.

Not all is lost
So the incessant criticism that Argentina could face after the defeat is harsh on them. Their title-winning stocks might have plummeted, but their route to the pre-quarters is still in their hands, and the defeat does not make a side that had gone unbeaten for 36 games, lifted the COPA America beating Brazil last year and thrashed Italy in the clash of the continental champions, bad overnight. Even the best of teams stutter and stumble, or so suggests hory. Spain had lost to Switzerland in their opening game of the 2010 World Cup that they went on to win. Argentina had lost famously to Cameroon in the 1990 opener, before they reached the final.
But more than seeking refuge in hory, they need to watch the first half to lift their spirits. Everything, from tactics to movement, were synchronised to perfection. The runs were swift and precise, there was little confusion or deliberation. The forwards delightfully interchanged position; Di Maria would switch flanks, Messi would dart upfield, Martinez would fall back. De Paul and Alejandro Gomes would press high and drop deep.

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Messi started as the second striker, but would often drift higher than Martinez, the designated striker, in an irresible storming of the Saudi box in the first 15 minutes. Later in the half, he would assume playmaking duties. The speed and fluency of the game rattled the Saudi defenders, who were often late in their tackles.
Not that they were flawless. Oftentimes, they left too much space behind, gifting pockets of space for Saudi to exploit in the second game. There were a couple of semi-alarming signs towards the end of the first half that they left unattended and Saudi, with a less elaborate style of play, exposed. There was tactical inflexibility too, as they didn’t conceive a counter-ploy to break the off-side trap. They let them be, and when they suddenly found themselves 2-1 down, they panicked. It could happen to the best sides, when they are winning everything and suddenly find themselves against a less fancied side. Scaloni admitted as much: “It’s better that we lost now, and not later in the tournament, where it would have put us out of the tournament. Now we have time to recover and we have the quality. It could perhaps knock us out of our comfort zone.”

It should not be forgotten either that the Saudis are not as asmal a side as they were projected to be. They have qualified six times for the World Cup, won the Asian Championship three times, and Rene Havard has instilled fight and feiness in them. “We fully respect Saudi Arabia as we do with other teams, that’s not the reason for our defeat. They are a good team with technical players, they are very well prepared physically,” Scaloni said.
He did not dwell too long on the offside goals either. “The reasons were millimetric. The off-sides, they have a high defensive line, we knew that any goal situation would go for or against us,” said Scaloni. “In this case, the semi-automatic offside technology took a goal away from us,” he added.
He urged his team to move on —“the analysis is over”— though they could revisit those two moments, one of madness and the other of misfortune.