Ah, the good old days of strikers. Where they were praised, worshiped and truly appreciated. They were heroes, champions and were used as the faces of clubs. The days before false nines and packing your team with an army of midfielders....there used to be a guy called Gabriel Batistuta.
What made Batistuta so amazing was how he struck the ball. This wasn't a guy just happy with placing it carefully in the bottom corner, even if he was only a few yards away. His desire to snap open the net was what made him such a memorable player. There was an aggression and tenacity to his game, and defenders knew if he got the ball anywhere around that 18-yard box, it was lights out. As for the keeper, he needed gloves made of stainless steel to keep out a Batistuta thunderbolt.
For me, a true legend of a game is a player who manages to rise despite the limitations of his team. So I'm not talking about Batistuta for Roma or his great feats for his country. Roma have always had quality players for quite some time, and any team that has players like Maradona, Caniggia and Zanetti in their team mean business.
Where Batistuta really stuck in my mind and made his name known, was when he was at Fiorentina. This was not the same Fiorentina who are playing great football under Sousa and are going for that Scudetto. Back then, they didn't have anyone of note, and were at best, a top six team. In quality, they were substantially worse than Juventus, both Milan teams and Roma. However, they had one nuclear weapon in the form of Batistuta.
It wasn't to the extent where he was surrounded by bricks, but he didn't have brilliantly inventive midfielders that would serve him up a chance on a golden platter. So any time a sniff of goal came his way, he had to take it.
More times than not, when a through ball found his way to him, Gabriel did not have the word "pass" anywhere in his vocab. He wasn't interested in "linking up" the play. All he had in his mind, was to be a sharpshooter and deliver the goals needed to make Fiorentina competitive.
When you look at the goals he scored, they are all pretty much the same. The power with which he hit the ball was frightening. From all sorts of angles, once he struck the ball, it was a sweet connection and it had too much energy for a mere mortal to stop. A sight to behold, and when I look round today, there really isn't a striker that is as cold-blooded as he was. Players have gotten too soft, and there isn't that street hunger that Batisuta had. The long-haired Argentina was the very epitome of a striker. All he cared about, dreamed about, and lived for was shooting on sight with the intention of turning the fishnet into a barrage of flames.
You rewind back to that World Cup final in Brazil. You replace Higuain or Aguero for Batistuta, or you even give him that chance that fell to Messi...we may be talking about the three-time World Cup champions from South America. Others would call me crazy for saying that, and point to the fact that Germany were clearly the best team in that tournament, and that trophy was theirs. This may be true, but I would have liked to see a Batistuta in his prime in that game, and seen how Hummels and Boateng would have coped with him. As clinical as Batigol was, he also knew how to turn up in big games.
Garbriel The Nuke Batistuta....we salute you.
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HH
