Big shoes to fill: 3 players who can captain Argentina after Lionel Messi walks away

#3 Mauro Icardi

Icardi celebrating his debut goal for Argentina against Mexico in a recent friendly

Top scoring with 30 goals in Serie A in the season leading to the World Cup should ensure a call-up to absolutely any national side. However, Argentina felt content with a spent strike force and denied Mauro Icardi a seat on the plane to Russia. Now that the rebuilding of Albiceleste is underway, it’s the perfect opportunity for Mauro to show why he is the next superstar Number 9.

In matters of captaincy, Mauro has some serious merits in his favour. Only 25, he already captains Internazionale and has done a pretty decent job. A fan-favourite, his goals, especially in big fixtures ensured the club’s return to Champions League after six seasons. More importantly, Mauro has the personality which is a polar opposite of Messi’s passive leadership and might satisfy some of the latter’s staunchest critics in this respect. He has the makings of a ‘rockstar’ captain the fanatic Argentinians desire.

The only challenge to him being the Capitan could be his very own personality. He has already raised eyebrows in his home country for some out-of-the-way life choices. Otherwise, Icardi could be the next in the list of ‘striker captains’ led by Harry Kane, Radamel Falcao, Cristiano Ronaldo and Robert Lewandowski.