Napoli’s Gonzalo Higuain has emerged as an alternative to Lionel Messi and his timing could not be more important for Argentina’s World Cup hopes.
The forward scored the only goal of Argentina’s 1-0 quarterfinals victory over Belgium. La Albiceleste will face the Netherlands or Costa Rica on Wednesday to advance to the World Cup finals.
Higuain showed the goal-scoring skill Napoli fans knew he had in the eighth minute. Angel Di Maria’s pass was deflected to Higuain’s foot and he quickly rifled the ball past a flat-footed Thibault Courtois.
Both sides had advanced to this round after playing in extra time, meaning this match likely would be sluggish from the start and goals at a premium. During the group stage, when Argentina were struggling, they leaned on Messi to rescue them from danger.
In their first match against Bosnia and Herzogovina, the Barcelona man scored the second goal which ended up being the decisive one in Argentina’s 2-1 win. In their next match, Argentina required a Messi free kick in stoppage time to take three points from Iran, and another two goals against Nigeria to help Argentina win the group with nine points.
However, Angel Di Maria scored the decisive goal in extra time against Switzerland because the Swiss effectively marked Messi out of the game. In this match, Messi had some chances but Courtois has been effective against him at the club level and continued to be so again.
Higuain came into the World Cup with high expectations based on his club play for Napoli and before that Real Madrid. To this point, he had been unimpressive. The goal will hopefully break his slump because Argentina need that second dangerous option if they want to win the World Cup.
As mentioned, Di Maria had played well against Switzerland and during his brief time in this match he again was a factor. However, he came out of the match in the 33rd minute with a thigh injury.
Without him, Argentina need someone to expand the attack and Higuain, when playing well, can go wide with the ball to create space for Messi or someone else attacking centrally. He also can convert crosses into the box, which Di Maria gave him twice in this match (once missed, once converted). With the ability to score in a number of ways as well as create chances, he lessens his squad’s dependence on Messi and forces opponents to spread their defence, creating space.
The injury to Neymar exposes a weakness in Brazil so far, that they have been unable to find another player to consistently score besides him. This has cast a major shadow and doubt over their chances to win the World Cup.
Portugal in the same way was over-reliant on Cristiano Ronaldo and when the Real Madrid winger was hobbled, his team was unable to compensate. If Higuain can be that consistent number two scoring threat, then Argentina have a major advantage over their opponents.
They can force them to pick their poison: double down on Messi and let Higuain work his magic, or defend evenly and let Messi show how special he truly is.
