Some recent comments from the national manager Sampaoli suggest that the squad won't have some of the best attackers in the world.

How would their ideal team look like?

Eh, I'm not really worried about the result. Smapaoli himself didn't want to face against Spain for the reason that he wants to tinker and find formations with alternative players and you can't really test that against Spain. Spain was prepping their first 11 and it shows, they bossed the midfield and the combo we had between Masche Biglia and Banega. Sad to say but Masche cannot start anymore. He's half the player he was in 2014.

Finding a solution is hard. Players that consistently underperform keep getting called for friendlies instead of upcoming players or other great players. Higuaín does not deserve a spot, maybe as third choice. Rojo and Otamendi pairing didn't work, if Rojo Is to play keep him as a left back.

All in all, hopefully this is a wake up call for AFA and Sampaoli that you need to be brutal and make tough choices sometimes when selecting the squad and starting 11.

Messi latest activity....

Deserted islands to send Gonzalo Higuain to

lmaooooo

@tiki @quikzyyyy Oh damn, thats good. XD

tuan_jinn

Ah, my mistake then. Overall, I do agree with you. Argentina have good midfield but not enough to win a WC. Germany France Brazil and especially Spain have better midfielders imo.

As for Di Maria, whilst he may on decline and people believe he is totally crap, I don’t think that’s too bad. He’s creative pretty good on his day. Some good performances he put in this season + last year too. It’s easier to be consistent in WC than domestic + CL.

Guys, I got a question for you, do you think Argentina can win World Cup 2018?

Realistically squad isn't problem (atleast not that much to struggle in WC qualifications) but everything I saw yesterday was straight embarrasing from them.

First half wasn't even so bad compared to second, it was awful. And it's not because of Sampaoli (great coach) but it is something along the lines of motivation, luck, idk whatever really. When you can't make better action with such (almost reserve) attack it is something that will make you worry. Spain's midfield completely destroyed Argentina's too. Awful way to concede goals and something is quite clearly wrong, and it's enigma to me, since it's not like they don't have any luck and tend to fail in tournaments, they have best attack in the world and it's really not making anything good.

I still believe they will sort their shit out before the WC.

I still see the potential in them. tbh, the squad has not changed much since the 2014 final (messi, higuain, aguero, di maria, mascherano, biglia, otamendi, romero and etc). they did reach the final with low profile manager sabella last WC so why not with sampaoli.

@thebaldgenius Yeah, but most opposition got stronger, Mascherano has degraded a lot recently, Romero never was one of the best goalkeeper out there, Higuain still choke badly in final, Di Maria is getting more inconsistent and Otamendi doesn't have a good partner in defense in my opinion. So yeah, there is a lots of thing to fix for me before they can really say they are ready. :(

@Emo: Spot on!

Guys I’m not ruling them because they got the X factor, but it looks like Mission impossible even playing with “ 13 players “ like you do when Messi is in.
If they are solid enough defensively, the offensive duty will be covered by Messi.

@tiki I know what you mean, its simply doesn't look good. :( But hey, they still got a bit of time. I'm not expecting too much sadly.

They should avoid Brazil and Spain early in the competition, once they got confidence there is a slight chance magic happens...

@tiki I'm not too worried about the attack even though they need to perform a bit better under pressure, its the defense that bother me the most, Loris haven't been at his best this season and I'm really worried he mess up at an important time. :(

You mean Romero :) I get what you mean mate.
New balls are complicated for all goalies lately, the Luigi ball of Tottenham-Chelsea and WC2014 could be a perfect example.

@tiki Oh man, I thought we were talking about the French team. Too much tread open at the same time, you know what I mean. XD But yeah, you are right, Romero is certainly a very error prone goalie and like you said, the world cup ball is going to be very complicated, I expect a lot of goal and of angry goalie. Will be interesting to see what happen with at World Cup. :D

I still think Argentina is a strong team and that they got a decent chance to reach far just like 4 years ago.
They struggled in the quals before too but once they enter the WC they are respected, it's a team full of top players that are capable of taking control of the gameplay and if only Messi becomes more arrogant and comanding they can win.

@Golazo Agreed, well, I wouldn't say arrogant, but yeah, Messi definetly need to become a bit more commanding if he want Argentina to get a better shot at winning World Cup.

Looks like Icardi and Dybala are going... they are called!

You heard it here but ARGENTINA WILL NOT WIN WORLD CUP.