Give Lionel Messi half an hour and he will sprinkle some magic to remember for ever. Most of the crowd under this vast roof had been afflicted with their own strain of Messidependencia for two-thirds of this game, whose low stakes had been reflected in both tempo and ambience. Everything before their idol’s arrival felt almost self-consciously like a prelude, played out in the certainty that a crescendo would follow. There was no need to worry about anything else here: why not get ready to bask in seeing a little more history being made?
You can set your watch by Messi, even if that does not usually mean winding it to the 60th minute. He had agreed with Lionel Scaloni that, with Argentina already guaranteed the spoils in Group J, that he would not be unleashed until then. After all, no chances should be taken for the deadest of rubbers. From the moment he came on this felt like an occasion, a moment in lore, another precious chance to distil the admiration for a legend of advancing years. So Messi delivered and sent another flock of starry-eyed devotees beaming into the muggy Texas night.
Messi had already wafted a free-kick too high, the distance unaccommodating, when he was pulled down 22 yards from goal. The position, almost dead centre, could not have been more inviting and its exploitation felt inevitable. Even so the outcome was slightly curious, Messi whipping the ball around Jordan’s wall with enough bend that it nestled in the middle of Yazeed Abulaila’s net. The keeper had, not for the first time, been caught flat footed but few were minded to preoccupy themselves with a discussion of his starting position.
Instead it was another moment to celebrate Messi. “He could have played 90 minutes but, without undermining our opponent, he wanted his teammates to have time on the pitch and save himself for what’s coming up,” Scaloni said. “He doesn’t think so much about the numbers people are talking about so I’m happy he decided that. He said that’s what he wanted to do and I was in agreement with him. That speaks volumes.”
Let us bring the latest figures up anyway. Six goals in three games put him two clear of Kylian Mbappe in a potentially extraordinary golden boot race; a 19th strike in all iterations of this tournament extends the record set on Monday and keeps the historians honest; it was, for the true connoisseurs, the first goal of his 40th year on Earth. And to cap it all? With that swish of the boot he became the first player to score in seven consecutive World Cup appearances.
The plan is that Cape Verde are made to feel the force of a freshened Messi. There is no point denying it: the draw has opened up for Argentina now, the likelihood being that Colombia or Switzerland are their only genuinely diverting challenge en route to the semi-finals. “I guarantee, believe me, that it’s going to be a team that makes things difficult for us,” Scaloni said of their surprise round of 32 opponents, but a serious shot at defending their title lies in the palms of Albiceleste hands.
Scaloni made nine changes for this meeting of teams who, thanks to the numbing and anti-competitive head to head rule, had nothing material to aim for here. Would any historic win for Jordan, who under the old rules still had a notional chance of progressing at the outset, not outweigh the harm inflicted on them by Algeria and Austria? The question was rendered academic by Argentina’s understudies but a jot of underdog romance was still saved up.
Jordan could say they scored the game’s best-constructed goal by some distance. They were two down and could see Messi warming up when their captain, Ehsan Haddad, lost Nico Paz with deft footwork. His ball behind Exequiel Palacios was perfect and so was the first-time centre by Essan Haddad, which Musa Al-Tamari converted on the stretch. It was smart, slick football and meant they had breached all three of this summer’s opponents.
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The Jordan head coach, Jamal Sellami, rightly expressed pride in that achievement. “But as we were competing with high level teams small errors were very costly,” he lamented. They could contend that Abu Taha was harshly penalised for a seventh-minute foul that gave Giovani Lo Celso the chance to take aim to the right of the D. His free-kick was technically sound but Abulaila, stationed too far left, had given himself little chance to save. Lo Celso, who missed the 2018 World Cup through injury, delightedly celebrated his arrival on this stage.
Argentina’s remaining subplot was the pairing of Lautaro Martinez and Julian Alvarez up front. Only one can partner Messi against Cape Verde but they were asked to play nicely here. Alvarez looks fit after his ankle problems but Martinez performed with the greater emphasis. He slammed in a VAR-awarded penalty just after the half-hour, having hit the bar in a move that led to Nizar Al-Rashdan kicking Marcos Senesi in the face six yards out. Martinez later clipped the frame from range and seems likelier to start in Miami.
The rest was left to Messi. “I just said: ‘Get warmed up, you’re going on’,” Scaloni laughed. “What am I going to tell him?” Yet again, Messi had the script ready.
