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Steffen Schmidt - January 27, 2022
Chile vs Argentina
South American World Cup Qualifications
Date: 28 January 2022, Friday
Kick-off at 00:15 UK / 01:15 CET
Venue: Estadio Zorros del Desierto (Calama).
Chile host Argentina in the 15th round of South American World Cup Qualifications on Thursday evening at Estadio Zorros del Desierto in Calama.
The hosts are in a desperate need for points as they hold the sixth place with four games left to play in South American zone.
They are just one point below the likes of Colombia and Peru in fourth and fifth position respectively.
The Chileans will enter the tie on the back of three wins and a defeat in the last four qualifiers. A 0-2 defeat to Ecuador on the home soil in November left Martin Lasarte’s men in a very tough position.
The clashes against Argentina are never easy for any South American team. However, the timing or this one is good for Chile given that Los Gauchos have already secured their ticket for Qatar 2022 after a goalless draw to Brazil in the previous round.
This is why Lionel Scaloni will be without his main player Lionel Messi who decided to skip this national team window.
Scoring goals will be a big challenge for the hosts, though. Argentina did not concede in any of the last six World Cup qualifiers.
Los Gauchos are unbeaten in 13 qualifying affairs so far in the competition and they will certainly be motivated to maintain such a record in the remaining five fixtures (the visitors do have a game in hand on the rest of the playing field).
Knowing that Argentina did not allow a single goal in six straight qualifiers and that only eight of Chile’s last ten World Cup Qualification games ended with fewer than three goals scored, we have to back the Under 2.5 goals FT pick as the main betting prediction at the odds of 1.53.
Alternatively, we will push for the goalless draw at the attractive 7.00 odds. We do expect a tight affair with very few goal-scoring chances at both ends and the odds are too good to be ignored.
