Argentina delivered a much-improved performance to beat Venezuela 2-0 in the Copa America quarter-finals and set up a mouth-watering meeting with Brazil.
Lautaro Martínez scored for the second game running to put Argentina in front in the 10th minute with a clever back-heeled finish, diverting in a shot from Sergio Agüero following a corner swung in by captain Lionel Messi.
Lionel Scaloni’s side had to weather a series of attacks from Venezuela in the second half and it took a strong save from Franco Armani to prevent Ronald Hernández from equalising.
Substitute Giovani Lo Celso scored Argentina’s badly-needed second goal in the 74th minute, passing a loose ball into an empty net after another shot from Agüero squirmed through the hands of Venezuela goalkeeper Wuilker Faríñez.
Lo Celso’s tap-in sealed a therapeutic win for Argentina in their first game back at the Maracanã since their 1-0 defeat to Germany in the 2014 World Cup final, which began a cycle of three consecutive losses in major finals. They had scraped into the last eight with a nervy 2-0 win over Qatar in their final group-stage game after losing to Colombia and drawing with Paraguay, but they expected a sterner test from Venezuela.
Venezuela once lost 11-0 to Argentina in the 1975 Copa America but they have made remarkable advances in recent years despite a backdrop of political turmoil, reaching the 2017 Under-20 World Cup final under current coach Rafael Dudamel.
But they failed to live up to the hype and barely got into Argentina’s area before half-time.
The victors’ reward is a first Copa America clash with rivals Brazil since the 2007 final, which they lost 3-0. The tournament hosts edged Paraguay in a penalty shootout following a goalless draw on Thursday.
