The captain of Argentina, more ‘Maradonian’ than ever, multiplies his status as leader at the gates of the semifinal against Croatia
A review of Messi’s career in the World Cups invites us to think that the Qatar tournament will be his tournament
Only 180 minutes, possible overtime aside, separate a player from his lifelong dream. Leo Messi faces a monumental challenge in Qatar, which seems to transcend the borders of sports and which has a country of 47 million inhabitants in suspense.
Never before had Argentina wanted a World Cup so much, never before had Messi been so close to merging with Maradona in the collective imagination of a country that treats its idols with an overflowing passion, irrational like all passions, bordering on the obsessive.
To Messi, and by extension to ArgentinaToday, a particularly difficult obstacle remains: Croatia, the smallest country of the four survivors in the World Cup, competes like no one else.
They have only lost one of their last twelve World Cup games, the 2018 final against France. And as with Argentina, he plays with the martial sensation of representing an entire country.
Neither Argentina nor Croatia will play a simple football match this afternoon at the Lusail stadium, scene of the final.
Qatar, his world
A review of the trajectory of Messi in the World Cups invites you to think that the tournament in Qatar will be your tournament: in 2006 he was a 19-year-old young man who had recently joined the national team; In 2010 he was already a star, but Maradona’s Argentina fell without palliatives against Germany in the quarterfinals (4-0), in 2014 he touched glory and was runner-up and in 2018 he crashed hopelessly against Mbappé’s France.
The Frenchman threatens from the other side of the box in a hypothetical final, but the feeling that floats in the atmosphere in Doha is that now, Leo will achieve the goal he has been pursuing for so long.
The data attest that the one in Qatar is being Messi’s World Cup: he does not lead the scorers table (he has four, to Mbappé’s five), but he will end the tournament as the footballer with the most matches (26) in the history of the tournament.
In Qatar he reached a thousand games as a professional. also equaled batistuta as the Argentine with the highest scorer in the World Cup, with ten goals.
A new version of the ’10’
The game that Messi played against the Netherlands not only qualified Argentina for the semifinal: it also served to discover a new version of Messi.
More canchero, more passionate, more caudillo, more boss than ever. Not even in his hottest duels in Barcelona had a Messi been seen so fired up, so quick in the melee, so willing to stand up for his teammates.
He had always been a football genius who moved awkwardly in other football, the one that Bilardo came to sublimate in his day and in which Maradona defended himself with such solvency.
Not now. Messi already knows how to move in this game of reproaches, protests, stopped play, intimidation of the rival and pressure on the referee.
A date with history
That is why it has been said that Messi focuses the semifinal against Croatia closer to Maradona than ever. He is quoted with history and with a country’s visceral need to revive the success of 1986. If Argentina wins the title, Messi will have merged with Maradona in the popular culture of an entire country. The challenge is enormous: the first chapter will be lived tonight in Lusail.