By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña
Was that the best World Cup Finals?
After 120 minutes of high-level football display between Argentina and France, it was Lionel Messi’s squad who had more gas and ruled the 2022 World Cup with a 4-2 (3-3) shootout win last December 18, 2022.
In a game of counter runs, Argentina showed poise under pressure and sank all of their penalty attempts which spoiled Kylian Mbappe’s terrific hat-trick performance.
It was a rejuvenated Argentinian squad after immediately turning on the jets as they put constant pressure on France’s defense which resulted in two first-half goals courtesy of a converted penalty from Messi and a 36th-minute goal from veteran Angel Di Maria.
This was one of the best starts Argentina had as a national team and went flawless in their offensive executions that topped France’s speed in deploying their help defense in the midfield.
Just when the Argentinian fans started to celebrate and bumped their hand-held beers while shouting in excitement and joy, the 23-year-old Mbappe went beast mode and took over in the last 10 minutes of the championship match.
The French superstar sparked his squad’s comeback after sinking a penalty in the 80th-minute and completed his brace with a thundering right-footed volley shot a minute after his first goal.
With the score deadlocked at 2-all, a 30-minute extension had to be done with Argentina drawing first blood after Messi’s goal in the 107th-minute.
Argentina was several minutes away from raising the World Cup trophy but an unfortunate turn of events led to a France penalty in the 118th-minute when Gonzalo Montiel was whistled for a handball.
France then banked on Mbappe’s striking prowess and equalized the back-and-forth affair off a goal conversion, 3-all.
After three minutes of injury time, France had one golden moment to seal the deal and go for a 4-3 lead but Randal Kolo Muani’s power kick was well-calculated by Argentina’s goalkeeper Emilio Martinez.
The Argentinians dominated in the penalty shootout kicked off by Messi’s calm goal followed by three more conversions.
Martinez came to the rescue again for Argentina after saving France’s second penalty attempt from Kingsley Coman. It was pretty much over after their third attempt from Aurelien Tchouameni badly missed the goalpost.
The 2022 World Cup championship title is Messi’s first after several tries which further cemented his legacy as football’s greatest of all time.
“We suffer, but we already have it, the World Cup. I wanted to close my career with this, I can no longer ask for anything else, thank God, he gave me everything,” said Messi.
