Pekerman praises patience

Jose Pekerman praised Argentina's patience for their victory over Colombia.

Hernan Crespo's second half strike kept Argentina top of the South American section after Colombia had Fabian Vargas sent off just before the interval.

Pekerman accepts his team's level of performance was not particularly high against Colombia but it was the attitude on show that pleased the coach.

"We were very patient in winning the match against Colombia and that was a very good resource from our team," said Pekerman.

"In these kind of games being patient is something very, very important and my players knew how to handle it very well.

"The match was difficult because Colombia did very well with their plan and they were also patient in doing it.

"I know that Argentina didn't have a good performance against Colombia and the supporters expected to see something better but at least they saw the team win."

Though Argentina are in a strong position to qualify for the finals in Germany, Wednesday's match-winner Crespo was wary about looking too far ahead.

Crespo said: "We had the obligation to win and we did it against a very tough rival that had already given us a lot of problems in the first game.

"Now we are very near to qualifying for the World Cup finals but we have to be calm because we haven't won anything yet and we have very tough opponents in the next round."