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By the time Argentina next takes to the field — at Wembley, for a meeting with the reigning European champion, Italy — it will be nearing three years since it last lost a game. Since falling to Brazil in the 2019 Copa América, Lionel Scaloni’s side’s only defeat has come against Sao Paulo’s health authorities. Other than that, it is played 31, won 20, drawn 11.
It is, without doubt, the sort of record that should stir Argentine souls ahead of a World Cup that has particular resonance: 2022 will, after all, likely prove to be Lionel Messi’s final bow in an Argentina jersey, his last chance to carry his country to soccer’s greatest prize.
But it must still come with a caveat. That coming meeting with Italy will be the first time Argentina has faced a European opponent since drawing with Germany in October 2019. Its run, these past few years, has been a distinctly local affair, built and made in South America.
Brazil, as it happens, is in much the same boat. Since losing to Belgium in the 2018 World Cup quarterfinals, Tite’s side has faced only one European team — the Czech Republic — and that, too, was three years ago. Brazil is currently rated as the favorite to win the World Cup, a status that is based almost exclusively on its ability to beat the same South American teams over and over again.
That sudden isolation, of course, is partly linked to the coronavirus pandemic, but it is also connected to the rise of the Nations League in Europe and the exigencies of South America’s endless round of World Cup qualifying and Copa Américas. There has, since 2019, been very little chance to play friendlies.
But as the World Cup draws closer, that absence of varied competition leads to a sense of ignorance. We can be sure that Argentina (which drew Mexico, Poland and Saudi Arabia on Friday) and Brazil (which will play Switzerland, Serbia and Cameroon in Qatar) are competitive in South America. We can have no idea at all how they will hold up against the European teams that both must overcome to emerge triumphant in Qatar.
