Argentina
Beginning with offensive corner kicks, which are considered crucial for both teams in terms of set-piece strategies, Colombia stand out as the team with the highest number of goals scored from corners in the tournament, totalling three goals. Argentina follows closely in second place with two goals.
Argentina repeatedly and significantly targeted Alexis Mac Allister in the area before the near post to flick the ball to another teammate on the far post. This area isnt usually protected by an assigned zonal defender, especially against teams with the man-marking defending system with only two zonal defenders, as shown in the photos below.
The idea of using Mac Allister is that he has a reasonable ability only to touch the ball toward the far post while not being marked by the best defender or even the best second defender of the opponents defenders, naturally, because he isnt the best header in his team. This mismatch began to arise again, and you can remember Dani Carvajals goal in the UEFA Champions League Final for Real Madrid against Borussia Dortmund.
The idea is simple because if you target your best header, he will be marked by the best defender. Hence, teams try to target a good player, but not the best, who can win the duel against his marker. The second trick is that he pushes his marker slightly after running toward the ball to cause a separation between them to win a second before him, as shown in the second and third photos.
Going back to the first photo, the second targeted player, who will go to the far post, starts with his back to his targeted area, acting like he would block the defenders for the attacker behind him, but he turns around and goes to the targeted area while the ball is on the air exploiting that his marker tracks the ball on the air focusing on the first touch on the near post losing the communication with him, as shown in the remaining photos.
Ultimately, it was easy for the second targeted player to score an important goal.
Going to free-kicks,
