By Jonross Swaby

This game was always going to be a bit special for Argentina coach Diego Maradona. His final ever international match was against Nigeria in the 1994 World Cup, before he failed a drug test and was banned from the tournament. Now, he’s facing the Super Eagles in his first ever World Cup match as a manager, and he has unfinished business to take care of.

Maradona’s favoured 4-4-2 setup was criticised by his own star men Messi and Tévez, so the World Cup legend decided to take a gamble, playing his team in a formation that they had not tried before, but would accomodate Messi and Tévez.

Sporting the facial hair of a spaghetti western villain, the Argentina coach opted for a 4-2-3-1 formation, with Tévez on the right and Messi playing just behind target man Higuaín. A number of players were playing out of their usual position, most notably Jonás Gutierrez, who took up the right back despite normally residing on the left for Newcastle.

Not that the Nigeria formation was without its surprises, however. The classic 4-4-2 was unusual for Lars Lagerbäck’s side, with Obasi playing on the left wing as opposed to his more familiar spot on the right.

Messi absolutely ran riot from start to finish. He terrorised the Nigeria defence with his one-two passes (often involving Véron, who also had a brilliant game) and slick dribbling around the penalty box. He looked like he really wanted to score – and prove his critics wrong, who questioned his comparatively poor performance in Argentina’s qualifying campaign, compared to that for Barcelona, even if by his own monumental standards. The man who coach Maradona humbly described as “my own Maradona” tried relently to get the ball in the back of the net, however this game saw him do just about everything else but that.

Real Madrid striker Gonzalo Higuaín also repeatedly failed to hit the net. He missed a number of chances that he really should have put away, especially given his form this season for the Spanish club.

One man who did find the net, however, was Olmpique Marseille and former Manchester United full-back Gabriel Heinze, and he did it just six minutes from kick-off. He was left completely unmarked during an Argentina free-kick from near the corner spot, and he headed home to punish the oppositions early.

Nigeria’s marking was generally awful, despite having some big players on their side. Argentina, on the other hand, were fluid on the attack, and frequently posed problems for the Nigeria defence. Considering all the hype surrounding Messi, it was surprising that they laid off him, allowing him to trouble the keeper with a few well-placed shots curling shots.

Nigeria’s keeper Enyeama was the only thing preventing his side the embarrassment of much bigger scoreline. He played an absolutely brilliant match, stopping one-on-ones and reaching out to make some difficult saves. There was a bit of worry for the Nigeria coach 23 minutes in, as his best performer went down in pain, but luckily for his side he was able to continue shortly after.

For all of Argentina’s brilliance going forward, however, they were predictably disorganised at the back. Gutierrez looked particularly uncomfortable, having to play out of his normal position. Nigeria should have capitalised on this, but the fact is they just weren’t getting enough men forward to take advantage of Argentina’s weakness in defence.

Nigeria finally stepped up a gear toward the end of the match, with both sides trying to make something out of the quick counter-attack. Uche should have buried a volley from Yakubu’s cross, but tipped it over.

None of the Nigeria players, bar Yukubu, seemed to have any sort of first touch and, added to their poor marking and inability to pressure their opponents’ defence for much of the game, they were simply outclassed in this match. Argentina will have to sort their defence out, however, if they’re to go all the way in this competition.

Final result: Argentina 1 – 0 Nigeria

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Tags: Argentina, Enyeama, higuain, Lagerback, maradona, messi, Nigeria, tevez, Uche, Veron, World Cup, Yakubu

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 13th, 2010 at 11:27 pm and is filed under Match reports, World Cup. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.