Piero Hincapie averages 1.25 fouls per game but picked up two in his last game against Mexico.

He’s fouled at least once in seven of his last eight games. Taking that run back further, he has committed a foul in 12 of his last 14 outings for the national side.

Last time he played against Argentina in a pre-Copa America friendly, he hit three fouls. He is very rarely substituted, with him playing the full 90 minutes in all of his last nine games.

For Ecuador to have any chance of progressing he’ll need to stop their waves of incoming attacks and is likely to pick up a couple more in what should be a physical encounter.

The second pick comes from similar logic to the first selection, but with the added bonus that Moses Caicedo is a more prolific fouler.

He averages 1.79 fouls per 90 minutes and has picked up five fouls already in this Copa America, with two last time out against Mexico.

He also picked up two fouls against Argentina in that pre-Copa friendly and a whopping six fouls in a 1-0 defeat in World Cup Qualifying last year.

He will be absolutely key to Ecuador’s chances of progressing and will need to be pressing in the middle of the park, leading to quite a few opportunities for tactical and cynical fouls.

A simple play but one that looks very likely in 90 minutes, given the way Argentina have continued to impress without really trying too hard.

They won all of their three group games without conceding a goal and have beaten Ecuador 1-0 in their last two outings.

With Ecuador looking more vulnerable at the back than might have been expected coming into this tournament, the Argentine side simply looks too strong for them to cope with and can’t see past an Argentina win, and comfortably, within the 90 minutes.

History is against the Ecuadorians with Argentina winning nine of their last ten encounters at the Copa America, and Ecuador’s last  victory against the Argentines came nine years ago.

Andres Matonte is the Uruguayan referee in charge of the game and he isn’t shy about giving out bookings. He averages 5.52 cards per game in his 1276 games as the first official.

There were six yellow cards in Ecuador’s final group game against Mexico, and four yellows and a red in their first match against Venezuela.

Even though the Ecuadorians were cardless against Jamaica, their opponents still picked up four bookings. Argentina’s last match featured six yellow cards.

With the one-off format of this game, we’re expecting tempers to flare and the foul count to rack up. This could be a big one on the cards count.

Lautaro Martinez has been in sensational form at this Copa America, leading the Golden Boot race with 4 goals.

What’s even more incredible about this is that he has started just one game and had just a combined 31 minutes as a substitute in the first two games.

So even if he is a potential substitute risk, his ratio of shots to game time is still impressive enough to look at. He had three shots on target against Peru and two each against Chile and Canada respectively.

He averages 1.47 shots on target per 90 minutes and there’s a great chance he can get some joy against this Ecuadorian side.

Argentina hit six corners against Peru, 11 against Chile and seven against Canada in their three games so far. Ecuador have conceded five corners to Mexico, eight to Jamaica and five to Venezuela. All three of those teams would be considered weaker opponents than this Argentine side.

A caveat is that Argentina were only able to get three and four corners respectively in their last two encounters with Ecuador, but the nature of this knockout round and Ecuador’s tactical gameplan and new coaching set-up will mean a potential change of strategy.

We expect Argentina to dominate the play and Ecuador to potentially frustrate them for a portion of the game, meaning the corner count could rack up fairly quickly.