Who would you rate as the best centre forward in La Liga?
Karim Benzema would be the first name on many lips. Luis Suarez, despite passing his peak, would also come to mind. Antoine Griezmann, despite his struggles to settle at Barcelona, is clearly a world-class player. And further afield, Iago Aspas is repeatedly the saviour for an otherwise shoddy Celta Vigo.
But another player who deserves more recognition and attention on a global scale, and who has perhaps been even better than any of that bunch over the last year and a half, will aim to strike another blow to Real Madrid’s hopes of retaining the title on Saturday afternoon: Villarreal’s Gerard Moreno.
The 28 year-old was the highest scoring Spaniard in La Liga last season, netting 18 goals to mastermind his team’s fifth-place finish. In fact, when penalties are excluded (he only had one spot kick), Moreno netted more than Benzema (16) and only three fewer than league leading scorer Lionel Messi (20).
And he is setting a similar pace this season. Moreno’s game-deciding strike at Getafe before the international break took him to four goals in seven league outings (he missed a couple of games through injury), playing a key role in Villarreal’s impressive start to the season which sees them occupy second place, two points behind Real Sociedad and two points ahead of Real Madrid going into their showdown at the Estadio de la Ceramica on Saturday afternoon.
Moreno has been established as one of La Liga’s most consistent goalscorers for a long time. His first season back at his boyhood club Villarreal in 2018/19 yielded 13 goals, preceded by two strong seasons with Espanyol (19 and 13 goals).
That adds up to 67 goals and counting in the last four years, but the reason Moreno is a special player is that he’s much more than just a goalscorer.
In addition to poaching inside the penalty box he is adept at dropping deep to link play, especially by moving to the right-hand side where he can cut inside and use his cultured left foot to play killer passes and floated crosses into the penalty area – an ability he used to register five assists last season, the fourth-best tally out of La Liga’s centre forwards (Benzema and Suarez both had eight, while Valencia’s Rodrigo Moreno, no relation, provided seven).
This flexibility is a blessing for coach Unai Emery who – like his predecessor Javi Calleja – has the option of using Moreno either as a centre forward alongside Paco Alcacer or starting him on the right flank in a 4-3-3 formation but with the freedom to come inside and attack the goal as often as he likes.
Emery, in fact, has the luxury of calling upon arguably the deepest and most varied array of attacking talent in the whole of the league. In addition to the finishing skills of Alcacer and the smooth all-round play of Moreno, the Villarreal squad also contains hard-working and deceptively skilful left winger Moi Gomez, explosive Nigerian right winger Samu Chukwueze and teenage Real Madrid loanee Take Kubo, plus veteran Colombian striker Carlos Bacca and promising youngster Fer Nino.
With that fine selection of attacking talent backed up by a strong quartet of central midfielders – Vicente Iborra, Manu Trigueros and former Valencia duo Dani Parejo and Francis Coquelin – it’s easy to understand why the Yellow Submarine have made such a strong start to the season.
The only blot on their copybook so far came in the third game of the season when they suffered a 4-0 thrashing at Barcelona after offering a dismal defensive display to make life embarrassingly easy for the Catalan club. That defeat – especially the manner in which it came – left lingering doubts that Emery’s team might possess the flair to dispose of lesser talented opposition but when the big boys come calling, they will fall short due to a lack of backbone.
This weekend’s meeting with Madrid, therefore, takes on a wider significance than simply the three points at stake. In the context of Villarreal’s season, it is a chance for them to prove their sorry capitulation at the Camp Nou was an unfortunate one-off, that they have learned their lessons and can now compete with the best.
Of course, it is also a huge game for Los Blancos as they seek to bounce back from the shocking 4-1 defeat at Valencia before the international break, so we can expect an intensely contested meeting between two teams with a lot at stake.
Moreno, without doubt, will play a prominent role in proceedings. Even with the two games he missed through injury, he has taken more shots on goal than any other Villarreal player (18, followed by Alcacer with 16), while his clever movement around the final third makes him exactly the kind of player who can cause problems for Madrid’s occasionally disorganised defence.
He has history against Los Blancos, too: in February 2018 he scored an injury time winner for Espanyol against Zidane’s men, and last September he netted the opener in a dramatic game which eventually saw Gareth Bale rescue a 2-2 draw with a late equaliser.
Gerard Moreno is the man for a big occasion, he is a man in form, and he is the most important part of a Villarreal team with a point to prove. With another strong display on Saturday, he could take another big step towards being recognised as one of the game’s elite strikers.
