World Cup 2022: Reasons for the Netherlands to be confident of beating Argentina

Louis van Gaal's side progressed to the last eight after a 3-1 win over the USA in the last 16, as Memphis Depay, Daley Blind and Denzel Dumfries got their names on the scoresheet.

Friday's match is certainly a tough one to call, and while some may already be leaning towards an Argentina triumph, a semi-final place is still there for the taking for the Dutch.

Here, Sports Mole looks at three reasons for Oranje to be confident of setting up a semi-final with Croatia or Brazil.

Recent form

Ever since being knocked out of Euro 2020 at the hands of the Czech Republic, the Netherlands have been literally unbeatable. Indeed, Van Gaal's side have played 19 games since the Euros and have not lost a single one.

In that time, the Dutch have posted 14 victories and five draws from their 19 competitive and non-competitive matches, getting the better of esteemed nations such as Belgium, Denmark and African champions Senegal in that timeframe.

Furthermore, the red-hot Oranje attackers have been on song throughout the past 18 months, as the Netherlands have scored in each one of their last 19 games and have racked up 47 in total - an average of nearly two and a half per game.

Van Gaal's side enter this contest having succeeded in six of their last seven matches, with the only draw in that sequence being that 1-1 stalemate with Ecuador, and should the likes of Depay and Cody Gakpo find their shooting boots, a 20th game in a row without defeat could very well be on the cards.

Head-to-head record

Out of the nine games that the Netherlands have previously faced Argentina in, the European nation have only lost three of them, and the two nations have been no strangers to meeting one another on the biggest international stage.

The Netherlands and Argentina first met in 1974 in what was a productive year for the Dutch, who won their opening friendly match 4-1 before thumping La Albiceleste 4-0 in the second round of the World Cup that same year, with Johan Cruyff netting a double on the day.

After losing to Argentina in the 1978 final, the Netherlands returned to winning ways in the 1998 edition, winning 2-1 versus their South American counterparts in the quarter-finals thanks to strikes from Patrick Kluivert and Dennis Bergkamp.

Argentina have also failed to beat the Netherlands in normal time during their last two World Cup meetings in 2006 and 2014, and while Oranje lost the latter on penalties in the semi-finals, suffering just one non-shootout loss in nine games with La Albiceleste is a positive omen.

Quarter-final successes

The Netherlands may have miserably failed to qualify for the World Cup finals in 2018, but quarter-finals have been meat and drink for the 2010 runners-up otherwise, and they have only ever lost once at this stage of the tournament.

Indeed, Oranje have reached the last eight of football's grandest competition on four occasions, and they have reached the semi-finals in three of them, with their only quarter-final elimination coming at the hands of Brazil in the 1994 edition.

Since losing to the Selecao, the Netherlands have played in three World Cup quarter-finals and have won all three of them, starting with their success over Argentina in 1998 before they eliminated Brazil from the 2010 tournament.

In keeping with the theme of eliminating nations from the Americas, the Netherlands bested Costa Rica on penalties in the 2014 quarter-finals, and the fact that Argentina's last nine World Cup exits have been at the hands of European nations also makes for extremely positive reading for the Oranje faithful.

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