{"id":44,"date":"2026-07-07T18:57:42","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T18:57:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/?p=44"},"modified":"2026-07-07T18:59:30","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T18:59:30","slug":"argentina-stage-stunning-late-comeback-to-beat-egypt-in-world-cup-last-16","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/?p=44","title":{"rendered":"Argentina stage stunning late comeback to beat Egypt in World Cup last 16"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Argentina staged a stunning comeback from 2-0 down to avoid a stunning exit at the hands of Egypt and prolong Lionel Messi\u2019s World Cup career with a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/sports\/liveblog\/2026\/7\/7\/argentina-vs-egypt-live-fifa-world-cup-2026\">3-2 win<\/a>&nbsp;to reach the quarterfinals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The holders looked down and out on Tuesday when goals from Yasser Ibrahim and Mostafa Ziko, either side of Messi having a penalty saved, put the Pharaohs in sight of a historic victory in Atlanta.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, Cristian Romero\u2019s header sparked the comeback as Argentina struck three times in the final 11 minutes plus stoppage time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Messi smashed home the equaliser to score for a ninth consecutive World Cup game and retake the lead for the Golden Boot with eight this tournament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Enzo Fernandez completed the turnaround with a superb header two minutes into stoppage time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At the end, Messi shed tears of joy as he embraced his teammates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Egypt were left furious after a number of controversial calls went against them, including a disallowed goal early in the second half, and a member of their coaching staff was red-carded in the aftermath of the winning goal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But despite a second almighty scare against African opposition, Argentina will face either&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/sports\/liveblog\/2026\/7\/7\/live-switzerland-vs-colombia-fifa-world-cup-2026\">Colombia or Switzerland<\/a>&nbsp;in the last eight on Saturday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Lionel Scaloni attempted to refresh a side that looked dead on their feet in the closing stages of a 3-2 win over Cape Verde in the last 32 on Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nicolas Tagliafico, Leandro Paredes and Julian Alvarez came in from the team that started in Miami, but Argentina got off to another slow start.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Marwan Attia\u2019s deep cross to the back post was powered home by Yasser.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Argentina staged a stunning comeback from 2-0 down to avoid a stunning exit at the hands of Egypt and prolong Lionel Messi\u2019s World Cup career with a&nbsp;3-2 win&nbsp;to reach the quarterfinals. The holders looked down and out on Tuesday when goals from Yasser Ibrahim and Mostafa Ziko, either side of Messi having a penalty saved,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":45,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=44"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48,"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions\/48"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/45"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=44"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=44"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aljaazeera.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=44"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}