Milan, Dec 2 (IANS): Inter Milan manager Roberto Mancini has said club Napoli’s Argentine striker Gonzalo Higuain is the Italian league’s (Serie A) version of football superstar Lionel Messi, who plays for Spanish club FC Barcelona.

The forward scored a brace against Inter to help Napoli beat them 2-1 and go top of the league table on Tuesday.

“Higuain in Italy is like Messi to the rest of the world. He’s giving something to Napoli that the other teams don’t have,” Mancini was quoted as saying by goal.com on Wednesday.

“Maurizio Sarri (Napoli coach) said we had one chance in 90 minutes? It didn’t seem to me that it went like that,” Napoli were very good and Higuain made the difference with an extraordinary goal,” he said.

“Going behind straight away put us in trouble in the first quarter of an hour, then the match was normal and balanced.”

“I think it was one of our best performances of the season and there were several positives.”