Written by Matteo Ciaramella
36.
Trentasei.
Such an insignificant and irrelevant number.
What can it possibly mean?
Ever pictured yourself wearing it?
No.
Ever seen a famous player wear it?
No.
Ever taken the time to simply understand what this number represents?
No.
But now be honest; when Gonzalo Higuaìn scored his 36th league goal in the 2015/2016 season, you celebrated. No matter what team you support, that bicycle kick has to be imprinted in your memory.
It almost felt like something out of a movie…
Last matchday, Gonzalo needs a hat-trick to break Gunnar Nordahl’s record of 35 goals in a single season.
Such a feat in Serie A is only reserved for the best of the best, once-in-a-generation strikers. Luckily enough, that’s what Higuain looked like that season. Any given weekend, you couldn’t look up Napoli’s latest result and not see the man’s name on the scoresheet. It felt extraordinary. But then again, 3 goals on the very last matchday, to break a record that has stood for more than 50 years? Let’s be real here, that only happens in movies.
Real life is not a movie.
Or at least that’s what we thought…
May 14th, 2016. Napoli-Frosinone. 71st minute. Higuain has scored two goals so far.
Dries Mertens gets the ball at the edge of the box and scans the field for teammates.
There. There he was, standing right in the middle of 7 Frosinone defenders.
Mertens would have been a fool to pass the ball to him. How in the world was Gonzalo going to make anything happen with that amount of pressure? Only a once-in-a-generation striker could have.
And that is exactly why Mertens made the pass.
Small chip directed towards the man of the moment: Gonzalo controls the ball with his chest.
And then, magic.
“NON È VERO! NON È VERO! MA QUESTO È UN FILM!”
“Not true”, “this is a movie”. The commentators had lost their minds. They could not believe it, even if everything had unfolded right before their eyes. A bicycle kick in the closing minutes of the season, with half of the team surrounding him, to surpass Nordahl’s record, and leave a mark on Italian football forever. This is truly one of those moments that no one would believe happened, had it not been filmed.
Ladies and gents, Gonzalo Higuain’s record-breaking beauty of a goal on May 14th, 2016.