For the first time in its history, the Albiceleste will start the qualifying matches as the defending champion and for the third time in a row it will be against Ecuador.
The South American qualifiers may be the easiest to understand from everyone. The premise is very simple: the 10 selected teams will face each other in return matches and in 2026, with the expansion to 48 teams in the United States, Mexico and Canada, the top six will receive a ticket to the World Cup. , while the seventh gets one last chance in the repechage. However, this was not always the case. The current format was set for the World Cup in France ’98, because previously there was not only a different type of event, but also the number of participating and classified teams fluctuated.
In this way, The Argentina national team came to play the top football event in different ways. In 1930, like the rest, she was invited; in 1934 he automatically got his place for leaving Chile, his rival; in 1978 she took advantage of it as an organizer; and in 1982 and 1990 she got directly involved because she was world champion. Since FIFA has decided to change this rule and the only team guaranteed qualification is the host (there will be three in 2026), it will be the first time they face the qualifiers as defending champions.
Thus, together with the 1938 boycott for the election of the headquarters and the withdrawals of 1950 and 1954 due to conflicts with other confederations, especially the Colombian and Brazilian ones, the Albiceleste has endured a total of 13 qualifying tournaments so far. In all, he made the rankings, except in Mexico ’70. In fact, she has participated continuously since Germany ’74.
For the third time in a row, Argentina starts the competition against Ecuador. In 2016, still under the management of Tata Martino, they went down 2-0 at the Monumental before recovering four years later to win 1-0 at La Bombonera.
On the other hand, It will be his tenth debut at home (seven wins, one draw and one loss) and returns to the River field, where he played seven of those matches, with five wins, a draw against Chile in 2003 and the aforementioned defeat against La Tri.
ARGENTINA’S 13 DEBUTS IN THE QUALIFICATION:
*Note: Argentina only needed to play one series against Ecuador to qualify for Chile ’62.
Source: Goal