Argentina's World Cup play has admittedly not been spotless so far. They started by losing against Saudi Arabia, in one of the biggest shocks in World Cup history. However, the loss was followed by a grueling victory against Mexico, and then they were also able to win against Poland in a match where Lionel Messi missed a penalty. One can only hope that the penalty miss does not settle in the head of the Argentine. At least Argentina can't complain about the draw. After Australia stormed out of their group and finished in second place, Denmark was spared. They could also have met France, with a bit of bad luck, but the French, like Argentina, won their group.Australia started the World Cup with an exciting first quarter against France, only to collapse completely and lose 1-4. But after victories against both Tunisia and Denmark, they were then able to sail up and take second place in the group. Argentina is a much better team than Australia, which played brilliantly in the last two games, but against France we saw that their defense also has flaws. Australia will put all their hopes in defense, and we saw how the Poles fared when they tried to defend themselves for 90 minutes. The key factor for the -1.5 handicap on Argentina is surely the early goal. If Argentina manages to score a goal in the first half, the handicap will surely come. I think Argentina woke up after the juice in the first round and they shouldn't have any problems today.
