Keep the context, lose the chronology: Deserving the World Cup is not on trial tonight

It will matter little that he is the most creative footballer, not only on the field at Lusail, but in any field in the world today. It will matter even less that this will be his last World Cup bid and that this is one title that has eluded him. Fortune doesn’t favour the man seeking justice; it favours the other chap.

First, chronology. He has been here before. Against France in the last World Cup in Russia when all the perfumes of Argentina — and that does not only mean the goals scored by Angel Di Maria, Gabriel Mercado and Sergio Aguero — could not stop Messi from being left landlocked while goals by Antoine Griezmann, Benjamin Pavard and a not-yet-20-year old’s pounding brace saw the Albiceleste crumble and crash out before reaching the knock-out stage.

He has been here before. In the final against Germany in 2014 — his third World Cup shot — Messi was ineffective, mostly sliding his way to the right of the field, his runs turning to trickle. The only real chance he had was when he went one-on-one with Manuel Neuer, and shot it wide. On the World Cup stage, he has shot wide since.
Messi needs to remember this chronology, and hold it at bay.

Messi will have to hold on to context: this game against France, a side armed with his fellow PSGian Kyliam Mbappé, a ferocious side, an intelligent side. Before the semifinal with Holland, Dutch manager Louis Van Gaal had hit a nerve when he had said that Messi is ‘the most dangerous creative player… but when [Argentina] lose the ball and the opponent has possession, he doesn’t participate much, and this gives us chances.’ Messi’s outburst on the sidelines after taking his shot during the penalty shootout could very well be sourced to the Argentine having taken Van Gaal’s exposition seriously — and not kindly. Because it had truth in it.

Leo Messi is capable of ‘participating’ when the ball is not with his teammates. His stretches of seemingly ‘doing nothing’ on the field – very few master midfielders walk about the park during play as much as him – are processing time before he creates strange, impossible formulations with space, time and ball. If Mbappé’s bursts of speed and force — reminiscent of a Maradona bull run — and striking power are overt, Messi’s powers are of the less earthly kind. His staccato footwork, sudden variations in pace and feints, precognitive 1-2-1s are not like threadwork, they are threadwork. He solves the very crimes he creates. For Messi to bring it on tonight, he will have to just be Messi, overcoming attempts hatched by Didier Deschamp to box him in and make Argentina 10-manned. He will have to do what he does like no other footballer — press play out of pause, and squeeze out space when there is none, subjugate time even as the clock on the left-hand corner of the screen appears to not be Messi-saddled.

Deserving the World Cup is not on trial tonight. Being Leo Messi is.