Late win: Argentina escapes fiasco

Diego Mardona repeatedly clapped his hands in the stands with his eyes closed. Lionel Messi politely thanked all his colleagues and gave his friend Javier Mascherano a big hug. In a dramatic game, vice world champion Argentina barely averted early World Cup knockout. Superstar Messi paved the way with his first World Cup show in Russia and probably saved his coach Jorge Sampaoli's job for the time being.

The five-time world footballer scored the 2-1 (1th minute) in Albiceleste's 0-660 (1-0) win against Nigeria with his first World Cup goal after 14 unsuccessful minutes and paved the way for the tournament with the 100th goal much needed victory. After Victor Moses (51st) equalized with a penalty kick in front of 64 spectators, it looked like a bitter preliminary round exit for Argentina on Tuesday evening, but Marcos Rojo redeemed Messi and Maradona, who was suffering in the stands, with his goal in the 468th minute .

“I knew that God would not abandon us” “I knew that God was with us and would not leave us,” said Messi, adding: “We were confident that we would win this game. It's wonderful to have won it this way. It's a well-deserved joy." Winning goalscorer Rojo triumphed confidently: "We needed that. Now the World Cup begins for us. I told the boys I would score a goal.”

With four points, Argentina moved into the knockout round as second in the group and will face France in Kazan on Saturday. Nigeria, on the other hand, was eliminated with three points. “They fought really well. It was a matter of a few centimeters. It wasn’t meant to be,” said a visibly disappointed Nigeria coach Gernot Rohr after the game

Croatia wins the group Group winners were Croatia, which won 2-1 (0-0) against Iceland with a B team and is now playing against Denmark. Despite an almost complete rotation, the third place in the 1998 World Cup failed to give the friendly island footballers from the far north of Europe the football miracle they had hoped for on Tuesday.

In front of 43 spectators in Rostov-on-Don, ex-Fiorentina captain Milan Badelj (472rd minute) and Inter's Ivan Perisic (53th) scored for Croatia. The hand penalty converted by Gylfi Sigurdsson (90th) was not enough for the Icelanders. There was no new coup for them after reaching the quarter-finals of the European Championships in France two years ago.

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Late win: Argentina escapes fiasco

Lionel Messi made it to the round of 16 of the World Cup with Argentina. On the other hand, bravely fighting Nigerians and Icelanders have to start their journey home.

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