2022 World Cup: Argentina vs France prediction, odds and preview

The Lusail Iconic Stadium will play host to the much anticipated World Cup 2022 final between Argentina and the reigning champions France on Sunday.

Les Bleus, who secured their spot in the final with a 2-0 victory over African trailblazers Morocco in the semi-finals, will take the field on the Lusail turf as the first champions in 24 years.

With a 3-0 victory against Croatia in the final four, Lionel Scaloni’s team prevented them from reaching the championship game twice in a row. As a result, the attention of the pre-match build-up has naturally been on one player.

A sixth World Cup final is now expected for the 1978 and 1986 champions after Messi created an elite group of players that made Josko Gvardiol appear foolish at this World Cup by manipulating the 20-year-old breakout star before selecting Alvarez to put the tie beyond any reasonable question.

Argentina has lost three championship tournaments, including the 2014 edition, and they now stand a chance of matching Germany’s regrettable record of dropping a combined four World Cup finals, but scoring two goals in each game since the first matchday is unquestionably encouraging.

Only Spain in 2010 managed to win the World Cup after losing their opening match, but Scaloni’s team has only faced an average of six shots per game in Qatar, and they will need to use this defensive prowess to prevent Messi’s teammate Kylian Mbappe from having a field day.

Before they took off for the Middle East, almost everything that might have gone wrong for France did. Key players had many injuries, there was constant drama off the field, and they just avoided being kicked out of the Nations League.

For Deschamps’s team, keeping their first clean sheet of the competition against Morocco was just what the doctor ordered as they prepare to play in their fourth World Cup final and attempt to become just the third country to ever win back-to-back World Cups, after Italy and Brazil.

Even though it was against Argentina, the 1978 group stage was the last time the 1998 and 2018 champions lost to a South American country in the world’s most prestigious competition. Football will continue to take center stage at Lusail for another 90 or 120 minutes until the inquest starts.