Falcioni’s draw: Polonia, Lewandowski and the keys to a game to win and not depend on anyone

Poland is coming and we are forced to win in order not to depend on anyone. I trust. Surely spirits have improved after the good victory against Mexico. And we already know what the national team is capable of: with space and time, they can solve any match because they have a lot of individual hierarchies.

It has Scaloni options. You can make changes or keep the same equipment. That game that journalists like so much. I repeat: the coach will know what to do because he is the one who has the boys every day and knows how they are, how they worked.

My feeling is that the centre-scorers will be the same, with Nicolás Otamendi as first defender and Lisandro Martínez as second. I don’t see the 5 line. Marcos Acuña will be on the left side and in the other sector there is the alternative of Montiel or Molina.

The question seems to be what to do in midfield. We have marked the differences between Guido Rodríguez and Enzo Fernández in the last column: one has a more horizontal game and the other more vertical.

Rodríguez is a midfielder who knows how to place himself between the central defenders and that movement causes and facilitates the ball push of the defenders. With Guido, both Otamendi and Martínez have to make more commitments at the start. With Fernández this happens less because he is the one who commands the start with faster and more vertical passes. Subsequently, Guido provides more presence in the passing game and Enzo can accompany attacks better. Against Mexico, for example, one headed four balls away and the other scored a great goal. It goes without saying that both are good options.

Poland, the rival

Poland won’t be easy, of course. For now, it is one of the three teams that have not scored goals at the World Cup (Brazil and Morocco, the others). They narrow spaces well, are compact, fast and have a good change of pace. In his two games, against Mexico and Saudi Arabia, he surprised with long balls. It will be a match in which Mac Allister and De Paul will have to be aggressive, both to play and to recover.

Lewandowski, the figure

If we talk about Lewandowski, we are talking about one of the best strikers in the world and that’s why the attention to mark him must be maximum. It is the beacon that all the Poles identify for long shots or forward runs to hold the ball and allow the flyers to advance quickly. How to mark a player like this is not an easy topic because he just needs to make one play well to solve a game. The good positioning of the central scorers is essential so that they cannot find it in any of our turnovers. Here the factor Guido Rodríguez can also come into play, who, inserted close to the defenders, can cover him frontally so that he does not receive either from his feet or from above. Lewandowski must be on top of him and well supported.

height of the glaze

The first thing that comes to your mind is that it’s not worth making avoidable fouls near the box. The idea is that they don’t have dead balls. Or at least reduce the margin as much as possible. The gap exists and you have to live with it. Otamendi and Martínez, apart from the fact that he is not very tall, test well. If Rodríguez plays, it adds up. Argentina will man score with a couple of free kickers on the ball. In these games you have to be awake because carelessness changes the course of the game.

The importance of changes

In the squad there are expert players and eager youngsters; it’s the perfect mix. Scaloni has shown that he has a hand in changing players before or during matches, but he has also shown that he can change the game system while respecting his idea of ​​him. Against Mexico he did it quickly by sending Rodríguez between central defenders to put together a 5-man line.

The candidates

I see Brazil and France as well synchronized and prepared teams. I like Portugal, who managed a group that seemed difficult. And Argentina is always there. The key thing in this type of tournament is how you got up the day you play and how you prepared yourself.

Aimar’s reaction

We all experienced what Aimar went through, he with greater dedication because he’s in and saw that it was a complicated match. We often want to downplay the drama, but there are situations in a match that we feel responsible for. We who are involved in this like to bear the responsibility that we assume, but sometimes it makes us experience moments of great tension. That’s what Aimar analyzed with that gesture. All the technical staff, those who are off the pitch, suffer it differently. We live it and feel it like this and this is the essence of football.

Bonus Track: The Cabals

I don’t know if the boys will have cabals or not, but in football they always are. We have fun, but the important thing is the work. I have them and I prefer not to tell them. I go more for the clothing side and stuff like that. When I was a player, for example, if they scored three goals for me, I discarded the gloves I had played with.

A couple of anecdotes, both with tech friends I won’t name. One was in the habit of hugging the rival coach before the match started. He was coming off a winning streak. So I stayed in the locker room and only came out when the referee called the start. We won 2-0.

The other had a famous trick: pass among the players when they went out together. He broke the line. We did? We came out with a flag not to let that happen. We won and qualified Banfield for the Copa Libertadores for the first time.