Argentina beat the Netherlands on penalties to reach World Cup semi-final

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Argentina have reached the World Cup semi-finals.

The South Americans progressed to the competition’s next stage after beating Louis Van Gaal’s Netherlands 4-3 on penalties.

Despite leading the game 2-0 for 83 minutes, the Netherlands, thanks to an inspired substitution Wout Weghorst managed to pull two back, including a brilliantly-worked free kick.

The two teams, which could not be separated after 90 minutes of play then continued on to extra time.

Although they both had their fair share of chances, extra time saw both nations fail to score again, which resulted in a tense penalty shootout.

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Unfortunately for the Europeans, two opening missed spot-kicks from Virgil Van Dijk and Steven Berghuis put them on the back foot from the get-go and more or less sealed their World Cup fate.

With Enzo Fernandes being the only Argentine player to miss, the South Americans went on to win 4-3 and will now prepare for a semi-final match against Luka Modric’s Croatia.

The first of the competition’s two semi-finals, which is scheduled to take place at Lusail Iconic Stadium, is set to kick off at 7 p.m (UK time) on Tuesday, December 13 and will be broadcast live on ITV and BBC.