Argentina

The most uncomfortable truth about Argentina in 2026 is that they are simultaneously the most decorated team in world football right now — World Cup holders, back-to-back Copa América champions, FIFA No. 1 ranked side — and the team most at risk of being the next defending champion to crash out early. Of the last four World Cup winners (Spain 2010, Germany 2014, France 2018, Argentina 2022 — note France 2018’s only-quarter exit in 2022), three failed to escape the group stage in the following tournament. Argentina’s group draw is favourable enough that they almost certainly won’t be the fourth, but the deeper they go, the more the same vulnerabilities reappear: a 38-year-old captain managing minutes, a 37-year-old centre-back at his last tournament, and an inability to control matches against opponents with a press as coherent as Austria’s.

The realistic ceiling is the trophy. Argentina have the manager, the goalkeeper, the spine, and the tournament muscle memory. If Romero is fit, if Messi finds the same body that delivered Qatar 2022’s last 30 minutes against France, and if the bracket avoids France and Spain until the final, this is genuinely the favourite. The realistic floor is a quarter-final exit on penalties — and even that probably requires a meeting with Spain, France, or England in the last 16. Group J should produce nine points and the top seeding for the round of 16, with the only theoretical threat being a Rangnick masterclass in the Dallas group decider against Austria on June 22.

The deeper questions are about what comes after. Otamendi has confirmed his retirement. Di María already retired in 2024. Messi has said this is his last. Scaloni has been linked with European clubs. The 2026 group of 26 is built around a 4-year-old culture, and most of the men who created it will not be there in 2030. The closer Argentina get to a second consecutive trophy, the more this tournament feels like the closing chapter of an unrepeatable book — and the more pressure the team will absorb in every knockout round to give it the right ending.

Argentina arrive in North America carrying the gravity of a champion — and the unmistakable feeling that 2022 was the last dance for the generation that ended a 36-year title drought. Lionel Scaloni has spent four years protecting a culture rather than overhauling a team: the same dressing-room hierarchy, the same midfield engine, the same Aston Villa goalkeeper who turns penalty shootouts into auditions. They are the world’s No. 1 ranked side, won the 2024 Copa América for a record 16th continental title, and finished CONMEBOL qualifying six points clear at the top.

The blueprint hasn’t changed much. Out of possession, the Albiceleste play a compact 4-4-2 with Messi shadowing the No. 6 and Lautaro pressing the centre-backs; in possession it slides into a 4-3-3 with De Paul scanning, Mac Allister carrying, and Enzo or Almada arriving late. The fullbacks — Molina right, Tagliafico left — give width that the front three rarely provide, because Messi drifts central and the two strikers take turns running the channels. Set pieces are weaponised; corners attacking and defending have been the marginal-gains lab of the entire cycle.

The vulnerabilities are subtle but real. Otamendi is 37 and has confirmed this is his last World Cup; Cristian Romero ended his Tottenham season early with the recurring hamstring problem that has shadowed him for two years. Behind them, Lisandro Martínez, Senesi and Balerdi are competent but not the same names. The bigger question is whether Messi at 38, finally training every day at Inter Miami rather than Europe, has enough explosion left in three knockout games on top of the group stage. He didn’t have it at the 2024 Copa final, where he came off injured.

What Argentina do have is the most experienced manager-player axis in the tournament. Scaloni has not lost a competitive knockout fixture since 2019. Messi has 26 World Cup appearances, more than any man in history, and he will start his sixth and final tournament against Algeria on June 16 in Kansas City. If the bracket cooperates and Romero is fit, this group should be playing in MetLife on July 19. If it doesn’t, this will still go down as the most decorated four-year cycle in Argentine football history.

When the AFA appointed Lionel Scaloni as interim coach after the disaster of Russia 2018, the assumption was that he was a placeholder. He had no head-coaching experience. He had been an assistant for less than two years. He was 40. Eight years and three major trophies later, he is the most successful Argentine coach of the modern era and the man who broke the country’s 36-year senior-tournament drought.

Born in 1978 in the small Santa Fe town of Pujato — the same hometown as one of his predecessors, Tata Martino — Scaloni played as a hard-running right-back. He spent most of his career in Spain at Deportivo La Coruña, where he won the 2000 La Liga title, and then in Italy with Lazio and Atalanta. He earned seven senior Argentina caps and a surprise call-up to the 2006 World Cup squad. The coaching path began in 2016 when he joined Jorge Sampaoli’s staff at Sevilla and followed him to the national team.

Tactically, Scaloni is hard to typecast. Argentina under him have played 4-3-3, 4-4-2, 4-2-3-1 and even 5-3-2 across competitive matches. What is consistent is the obsession with phases — set pieces are drilled to a degree few national teams attempt, transition moments are rehearsed against video of upcoming opponents, and the squad’s hierarchy is fiercely protected. Six staff members each submit independent squad lists; Scaloni reads all six before making his final call. The result is a dressing room where Messi, De Paul, and Otamendi run the cultural floor and the coach manages the football.

The 2026 cycle is his last with most of this generation. Di María has retired, Otamendi has confirmed this is his final tournament, Messi is 38. Scaloni himself has been linked with Atlético Madrid in the European press, though he signed an extension through 2026 in late 2024. What happens on the other side of this World Cup is genuinely unknown. What we know about his tournament Argentina, though, is settled: they don’t panic, they don’t beat themselves, and they have not lost a competitive knockout match in seven years.