Argentina’s Incredible Journey: 1990

Defending your title as a world champion is never easy. Not when you have so much pressure to outdo your previous performance. Having won the World Cup in 1986, 1990 was expected to be one step further…winning the cup on European soil. The opening game saw much of the 1986 World Cup winning squad play Cameroon, who had never won a World Cup game before, yet tied with both Italy and Poland in 1982, both teams reaching the semis.

Cameroon were to control the game, beginning to end, and kept a blunt Argentine attack at bay. A 62nd minute fluke goal hardly did justice to Cameroon’s skill, or Pumpido’s experience as the ball came in off his leg. The real magic of the game came from Caniggia, though, who kept the ball through two fouling challenges in the last seconds before Massing lunged in so hard his own boot came off. Yet the magic was to have a shimmering sparkle that faded, as Argentina were to lose to a Cameroon side that finished the game with nine men.

The Argentine game against the Soviet Union was a turning point. The game started poorly for Argentina as Pumpido was to break his leg in a clash with a defender, and had to be replaced by Sergio Goycochea. The Argentines made amends for their opening loss and beat the Soviets 2-0. A 1-1 draw against Romania put Argentina into the second round, as the best of the four third place teams that could reach Round 2. 

Their second round fixture was to be against their eternal enemies, Brazil. With three wins to their name, Brazil were only too happy to bulldoze through the Argentine defenders. Yet some fantastic goalkeeping from Goycochea kept Argentina breathing sighs of relief for the better part of 80 minutes. A curler by Careca saw the keeper palm it away, and as the rebound came to Alameo, a rocket was to be touched against the post. In the last 10 minutes, the other Argentine magician, Caniggia, took a stellar pass from an out of form Maradona, turned Taffarell, and scored Argentina’s only goal.

Into the quarters, and the only South American survivors were to face Yugoslavia, a dark horse to win the tournament. A 0-0 draw saw Goycochea again save Argentina’s hides, saving from Brnovic and Hadzebegic in the penalty shootout. Maradona’s performance went from bad to worse: Having let the team down with an uninspiring performance, his penalty was saved in this game.

The semis were to be the end of the road, surely. Hosts Italy hadn’t dropped a single point et, and hadn’t conceded a goal either. A fantastically worked goal set up by four players gave Scillachi the chance to open the scoring, after Goycochea had nearly foiled the entire attacking move. Into the second half, and Caniggia again showed why he was one of the true star players. A decent cross was seemingly just too short for him, Zenga came out to collect, only for Caniggia to manage to beat him to it and head the ball in, being the first to score against the Italian keeper in six games. Into another penalty shootout, Goycochea again saved from the spot, this time from Donadonni and Serena. 

Incredibly, the team that was based on a goalie and a clinical finisher made it to the final…with five goals to their name. Tournament top scorers beat that kind of record. The West Germans looked strong as ever, with emphatic wins over their weaker opponents, and doing just enough to beat their stronger ones. Within the game, Argentina did the one thing they could against German efficiency, which outdid both Italian determination and Brazilian style. Two red cards in a final said it all. Yet the showdown was as dramatic as ever…Voller brought down in the box with five minutes to go. And Brehme was to take a penalty against the expert stopper of the tournament, who went the right way but failed to stop the ball nestling in the bottom corner.

Though Argentina’s performance had not been up to scratch, their appearance in the final could be credited to two main players: Caniggia and Goycochea.

Joe Soubaih