Argentina and Brazil play a similar style of football and their World Cup fortunes in the last few decades have been nearly the same too, considering both haven’t won it for over 20 years despite the presence of a host of stars. 

A day of spot kicks

So, when Croatia equalised in extra-time and then beat Brazil on penalties in Friday evening’s quarter-final to end Neymar’s World Cup hopes, as soon as The Netherlands equalised against Argentina in the next match, everyone thought it’s the end of Lionel Messi’s dream run too. For the sake of the majority of the 88,235-strong crowd at the Lusail Stadium however, Messi plays on.