Poland head coach Czeslaw Michniewicz says his 'heart stopped' in loss to Argentina

Czeslaw Michniewicz spoke about Poland's 2-0 loss to Argentina, a result that helped his side qualify for the Round of 16 of the World Cup on goal difference.

With Group C on a knife edge heading into the final round, Mexico conceded a last-minute goal in a 2-1 victory over Saudi Arabia, allowing Poland to qualify when it looked for much of the second half that they would advance on fair play rules alone.

Second-half goals from Premier League duo Alexis Mac Allister and Julian Alvarez saw Argentina progress as group winners after Lionel Messi saw a controversial penalty saved by Wojciech Szczesny.< /p>

Poland will face defending champions France in the round of 16, while Argentina will face Australia.

Perhaps rightly in the later stages of the game at Stadium 974, everyone was crunching numbers as Poland's higher fair play rankings made them cringe at Mexico's expense - progressing thanks to three fewer bookings following the Alvarez strike.

Grzegorz Krychowiak's yellow card 12 minutes from time further reduced that margin and Michniewicz revealed he was growing anxious.

“We had agreed that only me and the technical staff would know what was going on in the game against Mexico, at some point I passed information to Robert (Lewandowski),” said Michniewicz .

"My heart sank a bit when Grzegorz Krychowiak was cautioned, we knew it was down three points and fair play was already taken into consideration.

"So Piotr Zielinski had to leave but we replaced Krychowiak because for five minutes we didn't have control of the game and couldn't make the substitution, while he was endangered by the second yellow card.

"My technical staff told me there was only a difference of two or three yellow cards so it was very close, we were at a difficult moment where it was 2-0.< /p>

"Krychowiak's mistake could have made us go back to the hotel and pack our bags but now I hear that we are going to play against France.

"I told them to avoid stupid cards, we did everything to avoid any provocation, to avoid talking to the referees."

Poland qualified from the group stage of a World Cup for the first time since 1986, and Michniewicz wanted to focus on that positive despite such a negative performance.

"We lost the game, it's very important but sometimes those defeats are bittersweet - or bittersweet - it was our case, we lost but we got through," he added .

“After many, many years we have taken the next step, I want to congratulate my entire team and staff.

"We are very happy about it, we worked hard, we won four points, the rules were clear from the start, we knew what counted were the goals but also the yellow cards."

The match in Doha ended three minutes before the whistle was blown at the Lusail Stadium, where Mexico conceded a last-minute goal as the Polish players - huddled around a screen on the ground - were celebrating wildly.

By then, Argentina had secured the top spot as they recovered from their surprise loss to Saudi Arabia in their opener in Qatar.

Coach Lionel Scaloni said the result should serve as a warning ahead of the clash against Australia, where Argentina will be big favourites.

"Maybe we didn't play well against Saudi Arabia, but we had chances to win," he said.

"We ended up losing so all the matches are difficult and if you think the match against Australia will be easy, you are wrong.

"When you're defeated you have to move on, you can't keep thinking about that defeat; we had two more games to play and we're done now. We knew we had to win the remaining games. ”

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