Montiel fit again and training fully, but Molina starts v Austria | OneFootball

Despite showing improvement in recent hours, Gonzalo Montiel will not be part of Argentina’s starting lineup this Monday in Dallas against Austria on Matchday 2 of the 2026 World Cup. The right-back is dealing with tightness in his right hamstring, which prevented him from training normally last Thursday, so his spot in the starting eleven will be taken by Nahuel Molina.

During this morning’s closed-door training session, “Cachete” offered a glimmer of hope by working on the field in boots alongside the rest of the group. Although this improvement will allow him to be on the bench and even play some minutes if the match requires it, the coaching staff led by Lionel Scaloni chose not to risk him from the start and confirmed Molina as the starter, after he had already come on in the second half of the opener against Algeria.

This new physical issue is unrelated to the injury the River Plate defender was carrying when he joined Argentina’s training camp in Kansas. That previous problem, suffered during the semifinals of the Apertura Tournament against Rosario Central — and which ruled him out of the final against Belgrano — had been located in the hamstring of the other leg.

This semester has been physically challenging for the former Sevilla player, who is part of the group of ten footballers who were unable to complete the pre-World Cup preparation properly alongside their teammates. Because of those complications, he had to train separately for nearly a week, missed the friendly against Honduras, and was only able to get on the field in the second half of the final warm-up match against Iceland.

Given Molina’s lack of playing time, as he did not feature in either of the two warm-up matches, the full-back who came through at Núñez — remembered for scoring the decisive penalty in the 2022 Qatar final — had won the battle to start in the World Cup opener against Algeria. However, this unexpected muscle issue now forces him to give up his place for the second Group J match.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇪🇸 here.