On Saturday evening in Belo Horizonte, the second round of matches in the World Cup Group F began. In the earlier match, the Argentine footballers defeated Iran by a narrow margin.
From the first minutes of the game, the Argentinians coached by Alejandro Sabella took the initiative, while the Asian representatives tried to exploit opportunities for counterattacks.
In the first half of the match, Gonzalo Higuain missed some great chances to score, and defenders Federico Fernandez and Marcos Rojo also made attempts. Despite the initiative, the score was level after the first half.
In the second half, not much changed. The Argentinians launched positional attacks, but the Iranian footballers increasingly found themselves in Sergio Romero's penalty area. Iran's striker Reza had several great opportunities to score after counterattacks.
However, the Argentine national team was able to break the opponent's defense: in the 91st minute of the match, Lionel Messi's shot from outside the penalty area ended up in Alireza Haghighi's goal.
This was the second victory for Argentina in this championship. In the first round of the group stage, A. Sabella's team defeated Bosnia and Herzegovina 2-1. Bosnia and Herzegovina will test their strength against Nigeria tonight.
Result: Argentina 1 - 0 Iran 90' +1 [1 - 0] L. Messi
Starting lineups: Argentina: Romero, Garay, Zabaleta, Gago, Di Maria, Higuain, Messi (c), Mascherano, Rojo, F. Fernandez, Aguero Iran: Haghighi, Haji Safi, Hosseini, Sadeghi, Nekounam (c), Shojaei, Timotian, Montarezi, Ghoochannejad, Dejagah, Pooladi
On the night from Saturday to Sunday in Brazil, the last matches of the second round of Group F will also be played. Nigeria faced Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In a tough match, Nigeria won 1-0 after Peter Odemwingie's accurate goal, defeating Bosnia and Herzegovina, whose chances of advancing to the next stage were lost.
The winning goal came in the 29th minute. Bosnia tried to equalize throughout the match, but the disciplined Nigerian defense and threatening attack allowed them to celebrate their first 3 points.
Argentina has already secured a spot in the next stage, but Iran and Nigeria will still compete for the second ticket.
Result: Nigeria 1 - 0 Bosnia and Herzegovina 29' [1 - 0] P. Odemwingie
Starting lineups: Bosnia and Herzegovina: Begovic, Spahic (c), Besic, Pjanic, Misimovic, Dzeko, Mujdza, Sunjic, Lulic, Medunjanin, Hajrovic Nigeria: Enyeama, Yobo (c), Ambrose, Musa, Odemwingie, Emenike, Mikel, Oshaniwa, Onazi, Babatunde, Omeruo
Group F Standings:
| Position | Team | Matches | Points | Goal Difference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Argentina | 2 | 6 | 2 |
| 2. | Nigeria | 2 | 4 | 1 |
| 3. | Iran | 2 | 1 | -1 |
| 4. | Bosnia and Herzegovina | 2 | 0 | -2 |
