The quarter finals of the Copa America get underway on Thursday night when we head to Texas for the clash between two South American rivals as the defending champions Argentina take on the highly rated Ecuador.
We are into straight knockout football now but unlike over in the Euros, should this match be level after 90 minutes we will go immediately into penalties rather than endure a period of extra time, which adds to the jeopardy.
Where to watch
The match will be shown live and in full on the Premier Sports 1 channel in the UK with the coverage getting going at 1.50am with the kick off in Houston at 2am.
Argentina
It was a pretty comfortable group stage of the tournament for the defending champions Argentina. They weren’t always completely convincing in all three matches but they got the job done and they did so without conceding a goal throughout the entire stage, even though they had a couple of South American sides in their section and a Canada outfit who looked pretty dangerous throughout the group stage, so defensively they were certainly encouraging.
If there is an area, not necessarily of concern, but where Argentina have room for improvement it could be in attack. We should acknowledge that they left Lionel Messi out of their last group game so he will naturally improve things with him being back here but there has been a bit of clunkiness about their attacking. They have got more than enough artillery to change things with should they wish though so I wouldn’t be going against them too soon.
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Ecuador
When you consider that Ecuador were down to 10 men after 20 minutes of their opening match of the competition, they have done very well to make it through to the quarter final stage. They went on to lose that first game but they have got the win and the draw that they have needed since then to progress and now they get a real chance to show that they are a nation that is actually on the up rather than one which is threatening to be the big improvers in this part of the world.
There are goals in this Ecuador side, but they are a team who probably need more of the ball than they are going to get here so it will be interesting to see how they cope with having to play on the counter. There is every chance that Ecuador might feel their best bet is to sit in here and try to take the tie to penalties. That would be a risky strategy given the opposition on show here but they have only lost their last two meetings with Argentina 1-0 so they wouldn’t need to improve much to get this to penalties.
Betting
This is the one quarter final I’m least enthused about betting on. There are two reasons for that. The first being that I’m already on Ecuador to win the tournament and were they to come through this match they would be favourites to make the final regardless of how the Friday night game goes. The other reason why I’m not really rushing to get involved here is we might only see one team playing the football which is never ideal, especially in a knockout match where a goal skews things more than at any other time.
I do think Ecuador will look to take this tie into penalties and if they can keep Lionel Messi quiet then I wouldn’t be surprised if they are successful at that and then from there it is 50:50 whether they go through or not. Argentina have missed some chances in this tournament and if they haven’t touched up their ruthlessness then the Ecuador tactics could very well work. I’m happy to see if they do so I’m not massive on anything over the course of this quarter final but I do think that given the way I expect the game to play out, the 7/1 on there being no goalscorer could give us a run for our money.
Tips
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