Aimar - victory is everything

Pablo Aimar does not want to play in another game like Friday’s defeat to England.

Even if Argentina make it all the way to the World Cup final, the Valencia midfielder thinks they might have already played in their toughest match.

Aimar came off the bench at half-time against England as Marcelo Bielsa sought to break down Sven-Goran Eriksson’s side.

He replaced the ineffectual Juan Sebastian Veron and is expected to keep his place in the side, possibly at the expense of the Manchester United star for the crunch clash against Sweden on Wednesday.

The South Americans, who were pre-tournament favourites, need a win to be certain of reaching the second round.

Sweden, however, only need a point but after coming up against England’s resolute defending, Aimar does not expect a harder game.

‘‘It would be nice winning 3-0 and playing great football, but this time the most important thing is to win and qualify,’’ said Aimar.

‘‘I don’t know if Sweden is harder than England. You can see in the matches that have been played that all the teams in this World Cup are hard.

‘‘We hope that the hardest has been England.’’

He added: ‘‘It was a bad day. We don’t have good days every day. But next Wednesday it will be a good one.’’

Aimar could come in as a straight replacement for Veron, whose form dipped dramatically from his strong display against Nigeria - although there is some pressure from outside the camp to play both.

Whatever Bielsa decides to do, the 22-year-old believes the two-time winners will beat Sweden.

‘‘We have reason to be optimistic, because Argentina is a team to go forward and change this situation,’’ he said.

‘‘We will need patience to break a team that will be looking for the draw.’’

He added: ‘‘The things we did wrong against England will change. We will defeat Sweden and qualify for the second round.’’

Ariel Ortega, another of the Argentina stars to underachieve against England, is not worried about the chance of being eliminated in the first round.

‘‘We don’t think that’s a possibility,’’ he said.

Bielsa has been boosted by the expected return of captain Roberto Ayala, who missed the first two games after pulling up in the warm-up before the Nigeria match.

Veteran Rangers forward Claudio Caniggia, who injured his knee in the Scottish Cup final win over Celtic, is also expected to be available.

‘‘I have faith in our qualification, because we all know what we’re playing for on Wednesday,’’ Ortega said.

‘‘We’re calm. We trust in this team. We have good players, and everything is set to win the match. I’m sure we will win.’’

To many observers it looked like Bielsa’s men were feeling the weight of expectation as they dominated possession but did not look like scoring against England.

But Ortega dismissed the suggestion, saying: ‘‘That favouritism was a media creation. Here everything is very hard, and the matches are very complicated.

‘‘You lose one match and everything gets harder. We never thought that we were the favourites.’’

For Ortega, bound for Fenerbahce from River Plate next season, the greater the pressure, the happier he is.

‘‘Now is the better part of the World Cup, because you can’t even draw.

‘‘Now we have to win the next five matches.’’