Argentina goalkeeper Emi Martinez celebrates after the team’s 3-2 win over Cape Verde.
(Richard Sellers/Allstar via Getty Images)
Argentina is mounting a challenge to Croatia as the kings of extra-time soccer at the World Cup.
The 2022 champions’ 3-2 win over Cape Verde in the Round of 32 on Friday was the third time in Argentina’s last four World Cup knockout-round matches that it had won in either extra time or penalty kicks.
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And Friday’s win was the first of those three games to not get to penalty kicks, after a set-piece goal put Argentina ahead for good in the 111th minute.
It’s a remarkable run. Yet it still trails Croatia by two over the last three World Cups. Since 2018, Croatia’s five knockout-round wins have all come in either added time or penalty kicks.
But Croatia is now out of the 2026 World Cup after losing to Portugal on Thursday night. Argentina will play Egypt on Tuesday in the Round of 16.
Here’s how La Albiceleste has worked its late magic over its last four games. It will probably need some more to become the first team since Brazil in 1958 and 1962 to win back-to-back World Cups.
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2022 Quarterfinals
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Argentina beats Netherlands 4-2 in penalty kicks after 2-2 draw
Argentina looked like it was going to cruise to a comfortable win over the Dutch after Lionel Messi buried a penalty in the 73rd minute for a 2-0 lead. But Wout Weghorst pulled a goal back in the 83rd minute and then scored 11 minutes into added time in a game that had been set for 10 minutes of stoppage time at the end of the second half.
Netherlands wingback Denzel Dumfries was sent off late in extra time thanks to two yellow cards, and things quickly unraveled from there for the Dutch. The team’s first two penalty kick takers — Virgil van Dijk and Steven Berghuis — missed their attempts, and Lautaro Martinez‘s kick on Argentina’s fifth attempt clinched the win.
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2022 Final
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Argentina beats France 4-2 in penalty kicks after a 3-3 draw
While Argentina’s win over Cape Verde was the game of the 2026 tournament — so far, anyway — the 2022 World Cup Final is one of the most iconic games in modern soccer history for more than just Messi winning his first World Cup.
Argentina again had a 2-0 lead through 80 minutes before Kylian Mbappé took over. Mbappé scored on a penalty kick in the 80th minute and then tied the game a minute later.
Messi gave Argentina the lead in the 108th minute, but Mbappé completed the hat trick to send the game to penalties in the 118th minute.
But much like the Netherlands, France’s early kick takers were off the mark. After Mbappé and Messi traded goals to open the shootout, France’s Kingsley Coman and Aurélien Tchouaméni both missed. That set up Gonzalo Montiel for the clinching penalty on Argentina’s fourth attempt.
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2026 Round of 32
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Argentina beats Cape Verde 3-2 in extra time
Messi opened the scoring with his seventh goal of the World Cup, but Cape Verde did more than hang around. After Lisandro Martinez gave Argentina the lead in the 92nd minute off a corner kick, Sidny Lopes Cabral scored one of the best goals you’ll ever see given the circumstances in the 103rd minute.
But Argentina didn’t need penalty kicks to get the win this time. Cristian Romero was initially credited with the go-ahead goal in the 111th minute off another corner from Messi. But the goal was officially changed to an own goal by Cape Verde’s Diney Borges.
