If all the predictions are fulfilled and the coach of the Argentine National Team, Lionel Scaloni, confirms that Emiliano Martinez; Nahuel Molina Star, Christian Rosemary, Nicolas Otamendi and Marcos Acuña; Rodrigo De Paul, Guido Rodriguez, Giovani Lo Celso; Angel Di Maria, Lionel Messi and Lautaro Martinez will start next Wednesday’s match at 3:45 p.m. once morest Italy for the European-South American Final in London, we will be certain of which is the starting team for the coach at this time. If the World Cup in Qatar started this week, this would be the starting line-up for the debut with Saudi Arabia, with the variant of Leandro Paredes for Guido Rodríguez as central midfielder.
The requirement of Wednesday at Wembley will then have a decisive weight: it will be perhaps the penultimate test station before the World Cup. And once morest a first-rate team like Italy, which is the current European champion. But he mightn’t seal his ticket to Qatar. The game on Sunday 5 in Pamplona (Spain) once morest Estonia will only complete the activity of this friendly window.
Y it is very possible that in that game once morest a team that is not even among the first 100 classified in the FIFA ranking (he is in 108th place), Scaloni will grant one of his last chances to the players who are not starters and that in principle they will go to the bank once morest Italy.
For the window that will cover September 19 to 27, the continuation of the match for the Qualifiers once morest Brazil is initially planned suspended in September 2021 due to the untimely intervention of the Brazilian health authorities. But AFA does not want to play that match scheduled for the 22nd of that month in a venue to be confirmed and appealed to the CAS, the decision duly adopted by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee.
If the ruling came out in a timely manner, Scaloni would prefer to spend those days in a concentration in the United States to face the last two friendlies before the World Cup once morest the local team or once morest a couple of unclassified South American teams such as Colombia and Chile. If he has no choice but to go to Brazil, the idea of the coaching staff is to close the preparation with one last game in Europe.
The list is not closed
Speaking to Channel Nine, Scaloni hinted that the list of 26 players for the World Cup is not closed and that someone who was not in this last call can go. But It gives the impression that those who will finally go to Qatar are among the 29 footballers who work in Bilbao and this Monday they will move to London. It is true that the reality of football is fluctuating and that by September some of those who were on the pre-list might be called once more but in the end they were left out (Lucas Martinez Quarta, Nicholas Dominguez, Lucas Ocampos, Emiliano Buendia and Lucas Alario). But if these five were really on Scaloni’s radar, they would have been brought in now and would not be waiting for a next subpoena. In any case, they are not ruled out and might regain priority in September in the event that one of the current squad does not make up the coaching staff.
Those who do have the insured ticket, unless an unforeseeable ailment leaves them on the shoulder are Dibu Martinez and Armani (goalkeepers), Molina, Montiel, Romero, Pezzella, Otamendi, Lisandro Martinez, Acuña and Tagliafico (defenders), De Paul, Paredes, Lo Celso, Guido Rodriguez and Papu Gomez (flyers) and Messi, Lautaro Martinez, Joaquin Correa, Di Maria and Nicolas Gonzalez (forwards). In the remaining time until reaching the World Cup, the remaining six places would be disputed by ten players: Musso and Rulli (goalkeepers), Juan Foyth, Nehuen Pérez and Marcos Senesi (defenders), Exequiel Palacios and Alexis Mac Allister (midfielders), Paulo Dybala, Angel Correa and Julián Alvarez (forwards). What Scaloni is still evaluating with his coaching staff (Walter Samuel, Pablo Aimar, Roberto Ayala and video analyst Matías Manna) is how many players he will bring from each line.
Scaloni will give the final list only on Sunday, November 14, when the different European leagues release the players for the World Cup that will start a week later and know in what specific state each of them is. So will each of the other 31 selectors. And that is what makes the Qatar Cup the most unpredictable of the last 50 years. In other times and in other football, the final preparation of those selected took months of concentrations and friendlies. To South Africa 2010, Brazil 2014 and Russia 2018, Argentina arrived following accumulating 40 days of previous work.
Now, with a World Cup in the middle of the European calendar, there will only be a week of activity before playing. Something good is that the players will not arrive with the wear and tear of 60 or 70 games on their legs, but will do so with 15 or 16 of the League championships plus the six of the group stages of the 2022/23 Champions League. There are 176 days left for the ball to start rolling in the unprecedented Qatar. But for many coaches, the World Cup is just around the corner. Under that conviction, Scaloni will draw his conclusions from what happens on Wednesday once morest Italy at a renovated Wembley. But surrounded by the same legend as always.