Holland cant afford to give Messi space.

This world cup has been a good one for Messi many arguing before the tournament saying messi cant do it without his Barcelona counterparts like Xavi and Iniesta but he has proved them wrong. In most of the games teams have chosen to kick Messi and shut down his influence on the game but even if its a split second he somehow manages to find the space and make something happen.



We all know the qualities Messi possess's pace,acceleration,dribbling,close control, technique and lets not forget how intelligent of a player he is in terms of finding space. In the game against Iran and Switzerland they knew his abilities and set up to nullify his threat by restricting the space he could play and dribble in, this frustrated Messi and was fairly quiet in both matches but he kept going to the final minute to produce one of the goals of the tournament against Iran this shows his determination to want to win. In the game against Switzerland they did well to keep him quiet but again all Messi needs is a little bit of time and space on the ball and he'll create a chance just like the chance he set up for di maria against Switzerland.

The Belgium game surprised me a lot as time and time again they gave Messi space and allowed him time on the ball. You expected the midfield 3 of Belgium especially with the numerical advantage to go and press Messi but they allowed him space and were lucky that he wasn't as sharp as he normally is missing a clear 1 on 1 late in the match. 
Here is a video of my analysis of Messi being allowed time and space on the ball against belgium:

Holland cannot allow this to happen and have to close down better than what the Belgians did. Whether the dutch play 4-3-3 or 3-5-2 Messi is the key for Argentina similar to Neymar for Brazil. How will Van Gaal stop Messi from getting space? will he put a man on him? if so who ? will he look to stay deep and counter attack? i believe Holland will stick to their counter attacking style we've been used to this tournament but they will not be scared  to push higher up and put heavy pressure on Messi and co.