England’s challenge on Friday night in a city designed by the architect Auguste Perret – supposedly the “poet of reinforced concrete” – is to deconstruct an Argentinian backline suddenly looking as unyielding as cement.

“We’ll face man-to-man marking from defenders who want to defend and be aggressive,” said Phil Neville. “It will be hard to break them down.”

If the dour draw with Japan on Monday is anything to go by the South American resistance choreographed by their veteran coach Carlos Borrello threatens to be as unattractive as some of the brutalist buildings in a piece of Normandy once dubbed “Stalingrad-on-Sea”.

Parris and White get England off to winning start at Women’s World Cup Read more

Rebuilt in straight lines – think the north American grid system – after being razed by appalling second world war bombing, Le Havre does have a growing fan club, along with Unesco world heritage status, but its concrete chic remains an acquired taste.

Much the same could be said of Argentina’s sometimes abrasively physical football but, as with the architecture of the host city on Friday , a gritty gameplan must be viewed in its proper context. After receiving negligible backing, both financial and logistical, from their country’s football authorities it seems a small miracle the desperately under-resourced South American squad ranked 37th in the world are here at all. Small wonder the point against Japan – their first at a World Cup – was a cause for national celebration.

“We’re going against a team that will sit back and defend and we’ll have limited opportunities,” Neville said. Indeed England’s coach conceded he was impressed by Argentina’s performance on Monday. “I think they took Japan slightly by surprise,” he said. “When we’ve watched them we’ve never seen them as organised and determined. We’ll have to attack in tight spaces, we’ll have very few chances to receive the ball in easy positions but we’ve done a lot of work on our play in the final third.”

As a former England full-back, he is steeped in the rivalry between the men’s teams. “There’s a great history,” he said. “You think 86, the Owen goal, the Beckham goal and 2002 Sapporo. What we’ve got to handle tomorrow is a country which is unbelievably proud. They gave their kids 90 minutes off school to watch the Japan game – that’s what it means to them. They’re going to have that fight. We’ve got to handle the emotion, the occasion.

“I’ve told the players this is a proud nation, a big powerful football nation. You are playing against history. When you talk about street football you’re talking about South American players who have grown up with nothing. This is what this Argentine team is.”

Jade Moore is likely to be in Neville’s starting XI as the manager almost certainly rotates his squad and has absorbed the message. “If we have a lot of the ball but don’t score we can’t get frustrated,” the midfielder said. “If we haven’t scored within the first 10, 20, 30 minutes we have to make sure that mentally we’re still in it, that we’re still doing the right things. Hopefully the goals will come. It’ll be a tough game, a physical game.

Quick guide When Argentina hammered England Show Hide The 'unofficial' meeting of 1971 The meeting on Friday between England and Argentina will be their second at a World Cup, as far as Fifa is concerned. But anyone with an allegiance to the South American team will argue otherwise. The unofficial Women’s World Cup which took place in Mexico in 1971 also featured a match involving the two teams and it is remembered fondly in Argentina. They inflicted a 4-1 defeat on England, who lost all of their three games, two of which were played within 24 hours of each other. Leah Caleb was 13 when taken out of school to represent England at the tournament and remembers how brutal the match against Argentina was. “We had eight injuries after the game,” she says. “Two people went to hospital and came back in plasters and others had injections. It was hard football.” Chris Lockwood, 15 at the time, also clearly recalls Argentina’s style. “There was a lot of gamesmanship that we’d never come across before,” she says. “We didn’t know how to avoid it – we’d only ever played honest football. They’re always talking about it in Argentina and how they beat England in 1971. They’ve been trying to get it recognised; they never shut up about it.” The desire to have their result against England recognised is perhaps because of the struggle women’s football has faced in the country since. Argentina qualified for the 2003 and 2007 World Cup tournaments but were thrashed on several occasions, including an 11-0 defeat by Germany and a 6-1 loss against England in 2007 which Fifa considers their only previous clash. Jill Scott was the only player in the current Lionesses squad who featured in that game, with Karen Carney and Carly Telford unused substitutes. Scott got the second goal after Argentina’s Eva Nadia González’s own goal had opened the scoring. Kathryn Batte

“I don’t think you can underestimate anyone in this World Cup, a lot of games almost turn into cup finals. This one’s going to be a bit more of a fight and we’ll have to make sure we take control and are able to play our football.”

Argentina’s hand-to-mouth existence offers England’s increasingly well looked after players a perhaps valuable sense of perspective. “Theirs is an incredible story,” Moore said. “The things they’re having to fight against really makes us sit back and appreciate where we are and the backing we have from the FA now.

“When you saw their celebrations against Japan your realised you can’t underestimate them. If we take our foot off the pedal there could be an upset. We should win but if we don’t prepare diligently and do things properly anything can happen; that’s the beauty of the World Cup.”

Moore’s knack of delivering defender-destabilising incisive through passes could come in handy. “It’s going to be about making the right decisions,” she said. “About moving the ball quickly and stretching them so we can hurt them.”

Borrello believes he can limit the damage. “England is a great team, and a more vertical team than Japan,” he said. “But we have some things up our sleeves.” Perhaps inevitability he was asked if memories of the Falklands War could influence proceedings. “I don’t think politics have a place,” he replied diplomatically. “This is about football rivalry and that’s it.”

Neville hopes the Argentinian FA will emulate England’s example. “Carlos’s team are at a start of a journey where we were 15 years ago,” he said. “Some of my players like Karen Carney and Jill Scott remember turning up to training with no coaches or bibs. The backing we’ve had from the FA is phenomenal, more than I’ve asked for. We feel blessed.”