Whether Lionel Messi Wins The World Cup Or Not, His Legacy Is Unblemished

And then there was just one.

One more game for Lionel Messi to weave his magic and pull one last 90 minutes of sublime genius out of the hat and join Diego Maradona, Pele, Zinedine Zidane and the other truly elite superstars that have won the World Cup in a fashion very few have been able to do.

For all of Messi’s seven Ballon d’Ors, there was always somewhat of an asterisk before them. That nagging feeling that, yes, he won absolutely everything with Barcelona and on an individual level, but the World Cup was the one that was really missing, that one piece of silverware that many felt Messi needed to be labelled the undisputed ‘greatest of all time’.

Of course, as we all know, such debates are entirely subjective, and the truth of the matter is Messi doesn’t need to win a World Cup to embellish his legacy as one of the greatest players to ever kick a ball. The proof has been in that pudding for a long time already.

But what Messi did need was a World Cup in which he felt like the leader of an Argentina side, to be seen to be dragging them towards a possible third world crown. Maradona did it in 1986 and 1990, and Messi is inevitably compared to Maradona, whether deep down he likes it or not.

And after the disappointments of 2010, 2014 and 2018, in which Messi almost seemed overwhelmed with the responsibility of being the ‘man’ for Argentina and leading the charge, he seems at peace with it now, a man comfortable in his own skin and where he stands within this Argentina team and his role as captain and, ultimately, saving grace.

For make no mistake about it, this Argentina without Messi wouldn’t be anywhere close to competing in a sixth World Cup final. Much like Maradona at Italia ’90, Messi is the deciding factor between a very average Argentina side who likely wouldn’t have made it out of the group stage, and a good side who are now competing in their second final in three tournaments. Messi is the sole difference.

This has been his World Cup, no matter how it ends on Sunday.

His converted penalty against Croatia was his third of the tournament – his fifth goal overall – and it took him one clear of the legendary Gabriel Batistuta at the top of Argentina goal scorers at World Cups.

Croatia had, in truth, outstayed their welcome at the tournament. Perhaps fatigued by the penalty shootout wins over Japan and Brazil, they offered little in the way of attacking threat to Argentina’s back line. Messi, as he has done throughout the tournament, varied between walking and shuffling, waiting for the exact moment to make his mark on the game.

Apart from his outrageous no-look-reverse-pass to Nahuel Molina in the game against The Netherlands that gave Argentina the lead, the other outstanding ‘Messi’ moment of this World Cup came in the 68^th minute against Croatia, when he turned poor Josko Gvardiol inside out – and back again.

Gvardiol’s already burgeoning reputation has increased exponentially throughout the tournament. He, along with the ever-brilliant Luka Modric, have arguably been Croatia’s best players at the World Cup. Yet the 20-year-old could do little to stop Messi from rolling back the years in that sequence of events that showed us that when Messi decides to pick his moments, he well and truly makes them count.

There, we saw glimpses of the 2012 Messi, twisting and turning Gvardiol, reducing him to a pile of mangled limbs as he weaved one way then another, bringing the ball to the touchline before cutting it back for Julian Alvarez to net his second goal of the game and put the game beyond all doubt. Argentina had let a two-goal lead slip against the Dutch in the quarter final. They weren’t making the same mistake in the semis.

Now, with Messi assured of one more crack at lifting the World Cup, one final game to further rubber-stamp his genius not just on this tournament, but on the game as whole, he has to dig deep once more to see his nation over the line.

France or Morocco will undoubtedly prove a much sterner test than a listless Croatia did in the final, and should it not go Messi’s way on Sunday, it won’t affect his legacy one bit, as he’s did the one thing that he’s always been accused of not doing – taking an average team and bringing them to the verge of greatness.