Four teams remain. France, Spain, England, Argentina. The defending champions sit one win away from another final, facing England in Atlanta on July 15. Every team left has earned its place, nobody wins a World Cup by accident. But strip away the emotion for a moment and look purely at the road Argentina has walked to get here, and an uncomfortable question begins to emerge: has this been the most favourable path of any remaining semifinalist, or are critics simply refusing to give the defending champions the credit they deserve?
Start at the beginning. Argentina were drawn into Group J alongside Algeria, Austria and World Cup debutants Jordan – a group with zero teams ranked inside the world’s top 15. They won every match, scored freely, and Messi broke Ronaldo’s own World Cup age record for a hat-trick without breaking much of a sweat.
Now look at Portugal. Drawn into a group with DR Congo, Uzbekistan and Colombia, Ronaldo’s side also qualified but Colombia alone gave them more resistance in 90 minutes than Argentina saw across three matches combined, holding Portugal to a goalless draw. And Portugal’s group stage was the easy part. The moment the real football started, Spain ended their World Cup in the Round of 16.
So here’s the first question worth asking: if Portugal, with arguably no easier a group than Argentina’s, ran straight into a footballing superpower the moment the knockouts began – why didn’t Argentina?
Round of 32: Cape Verde, ranked 67th in the world. Round of 16: Egypt, 29th. Quarter-final: Switzerland, 19th. On paper, Argentina avoided facing a top 15 nation before the semi finals. While Switzerland are a respected and well organized side, many fans would argue that Argentina’s path has looked considerably less demanding than those navigated by France, Spain or England, and it’s fair to ask whether the bracket itself was ever going to let Argentina’s title defense end early.
Is that simply the luck of the draw? Quite possibly. But it has also led many supporters and pundits to question whether Argentina have benefited from a noticeably kinder route than several of their biggest rivals.
The GOAT Debate FIFA Can’t Seem to Stay Out Of
Ronaldo left this World Cup in tears, his sixth and final tournament ending without the one trophy that always eluded him. Messi, five years older than he was when he finally won it in 2022, is still playing, still scoring, still the face of every broadcast graphic. And that timing — Ronaldo’s exit landing in the same week Argentina were involved in the tournament’s most controversial night — reignited a rivalry that’s supposedly settled but clearly isn’t.
Here’s the question that has fueled endless debate online: is it merely coincidence that football’s biggest storyline continues to survive, or are fans reading too much into a series of favorable circumstances?
Every marginal call, every kind draw, every “50/50 that went Argentina’s way” gets read through the same lens now — because whether that perception is fair or not, many critics believe FIFA benefits commercially whenever one of the sport’s biggest stars remains in the tournament. Others dismiss that argument entirely, insisting Argentina’s progress has been earned on the pitch. That divide is precisely why every refereeing decision involving Messi’s side is now scrutinized more intensely than almost any other.
Ask Egypt and there’s no ambiguity. Trailing 2-0 with 11 minutes left, they watched a goal get chalked off by VAR after Marwan Attia was judged to have fouled Lisandro Martínez, a full length of the pitch away from where the ball was, in the buildup. Multiple broadcast officiating experts questioned whether that even fell within VAR’s remit. Argentina then scored three unanswered goals in 13 minutes to win 3-2.
But here’s the part that should bother anyone claiming this was simply consistent officiating: minutes later, in the buildup to Argentina’s own winning goal, Egypt’s Hamdi Fathy claimed he was held by Alexis Mac Allister in the exact same kind of contact — and this time, officials didn’t send it to review at all. No stoppage. No pitchside monitor. Play simply continued, and Enzo Fernández’s stoppage-time header stood. The same tournament, the same match, arguably the same category of foul — reviewed and punished when it cost Argentina a goal, ignored when it would have cost them one.
Egypt’s football association said afterward it could not stay silent about the officiating. Their coach called it an injustice. FIFA’s refereeing chief said there was no bias at all. So who do you believe — a federation that watched the exact same type of incident get treated two different ways in the space of twenty minutes, or the governing body investigating itself?
Add in the numbers — three penalties awarded to Argentina this tournament, more than England or Switzerland received — and then add in FIFA’s decision to hand the France-Morocco quarter-final to an entirely Argentine officiating crew, a first at this World Cup. None of these points, taken individually, prove bias or wrongdoings. Taken together, however, they have fueled a level of scrutiny that few teams at this tournament have experienced.
Two semi-finals now stand between the field and the trophy. France face Spain on July 14 in Dallas, a genuine heavyweight collision between two of the tournament’s most in-form sides. A day later, in Atlanta, Argentina face England — arguably the sternest test Messi’s side will have had all tournament, against a team that has grown into the competition behind Jude Bellingham and looked increasingly dangerous with every round. The winners meet in the final on July 19, with the third-place match the day before.
For England fans, this fixture already carries an edge beyond the football. There’s the old rivalry, the ’86 and ’98 and ’02 history, and now a newer layer: a growing belief among many neutrals that this is Argentina’s toughest examination yet—a matchup against one of the strongest teams they’ve faced in the tournament.
Expect every fifty-fifty call in this one to be dissected in real time — a foul in the box, a VAR review, even a throw-in decision will be measured against everything that’s happened in Argentina’s last three matches. If England go out on a marginal call, the reaction won’t just be disappointment; it’ll be confirmation, for many, of something they already suspected. If Argentina win clean and convincing, some of this conversation quiets down. If they win ugly, it gets louder than ever.
Maybe Argentina are simply doing what great champions always do: beating the opponents placed in front of them while ignoring the noise around them. Or maybe, when this World Cup is remembered years from now, fans will look back at the favorable draw, the controversial officiating moments and the comparatively smoother path to the semifinals and continue asking whether fortune smiled on the defending champions more than anyone else. Whatever the answer, one thing is certain: against England in Atlanta, Argentina will face their toughest challenge yet—and perhaps the match that settles this debate once and for all.
