Messi's Argentina face Spain's cool machine in World Cup final rich with personal twists

Argentina and Spain were supposed to settle a score in Qatar earlier this year, in the Finalissima between the champions of South America and Europe, ​before U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran forced the match to be cancelled.

On Sunday in New Jersey, they will finally meet with rather more than ceremonial silverware at stake.

The World Cup ‌final offers football's grandest stage a deliciously odd pairing: Argentina, all pulse, fire and Lionel Messi, against Spain, the European champions who appear to treat chaos as an administrative error and have turned control into something close to an art form.

It is South America v Europe, passion v precision, a match threaded with curious personal history, from the touchline to La Masia, where Barcelona's greatest graduate, Messi, will face teenager Lamine Yamal, the academy's dazzling young heir.

Argentina are back in ​the final four years after their cathartic triumph in Qatar, when Messi finally lifted the trophy in a breathless win over France. Back then, with Messi aged 35, another World ​Cup final seemed fanciful. Now 39, he is still bending time, defenders and probability.

Argentina's campaign has been less a smooth title defence than a pilgrimage ⁠through suffering. With 17 members of their 26-man squad having been part of the 2022 triumph, Lionel Scaloni's side have reached the final the hard way: beating Cape Verde in extra time and ​surviving nerve-shredding clashes with Egypt, Switzerland and England.

They have played at times like a team with their hearts on the toe of their boots, powered by Messi's goals, assists and flashes of sorcery. Each ​intervention has added another page to the never-ending argument over whether he or Brazilian Pele is the greatest footballer in history.

If Argentina have had the air of Rocky Balboa staggering through another round, Spain have arrived looking more like cool operators who know where the exits are.

Unbeaten in 37 matches, Spain can win their second World Cup, after 2010, and break the international unbeaten record set by Italy between 2018 and 2021.

They arrived in North America ​as the bookmakers' favourites after winning the European Championship and have largely carried themselves like a side that sees pressure not as danger, but as a meeting already scheduled.

Their route has seemed carefully ​mapped, as if everything before the semi-final was part of the warm-up. Under Luis de la Fuente, who has coached many of the squad since their teenage years in Spain's youth system, they have developed a level ‌of collective understanding ⁠that can make opponents feel trapped in a beautifully lit room with no doors. France will understand that feeling well.

Spain's passing and positional play can suffocate, but within the machinery there is wild invention too, and most of it comes from Lamine.

The winger, who enchanted the European Championship as a 16-year-old, has spent his short career shredding age records and expectations. Since making his Barcelona debut at 15, he has invited comparisons with the most famous product of La Masia — the man facing him on Sunday.

Messi and Lamine are also linked by one of football's strangest viral images: Messi, as a young Barcelona ​player, pictured bathing baby Lamine. What once looked ​like a quaint curiosity now feels like an ⁠omen drafted by a particularly playful scriptwriter.

When asked whether Messi’s talent had been passed on to Lamine that day, like the Midas touch, Lamine’s father replied: “Who’s to say it wasn’t the other way round?”

The connections continue on the bench. Scaloni will face De la Fuente, who was his tutor on the ​Spanish Football Federation coaching course nearly a decade ago. The pupil now meets the teacher with the World Cup at stake.

The final may also ​be shaped by the conditions. ⁠The New Jersey pitch has not been kind to possession teams, with coaches and players complaining about its quality during the tournament. That could complicate Spain's rhythm and invite Argentina into the kind of broken, emotional contest they relish.

The weather may add another layer of intrigue. A hot and humid day is expected, with temperatures around 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit), and it will be only Spain's second match in an open-air ⁠stadium at ​this World Cup. Wildfire smoke from Canada has also blanketed parts of the U.S. Midwest and Northeast with hazardous air, ​raising concerns with more than 80,000 fans expected at the final.

For Spain, the task is to keep the match clean, controlled and played to their patterns. For Argentina, it is to turn discomfort into theatre one more time.

At the centre of it ​all stands Messi, trying to ensure that what could be his last World Cup match ends not as a farewell, but as one final act of mastery.