Lionel Messi said on Monday (July 20, 2026) that after Argentina’s World Cup final loss, “the pain is immense and it’s going to take a long time for this wound to heal.”

“I’d also like to congratulate Spain on winning the tournament,” added the 39-year-old, who broke down in tears after the defeat.

In the knockout rounds, Argentina came from behind to beat Egypt and England and had to go to extra time to beat Cape Verde and Switzerland.

“With the matches we turned around by giving our all – matches that will remain in our memories forever – and with the support of an entire country, which, together with the hard work and effort of this squad, led us to once again be among the best in the world,” the Inter Miami forward wrote in the post.

Having scored eight goals during the tournament, Messi, an eight-time Ballon d’Or winner as best player in the world, failed to make an impact in the final, much like his team, which was unable to pose a threat to a better-organised Spanish side.

At the World Cup, he has now lost two finals, in 2014 and 2026, and won one, in 2022, against France.

Argentinian media reported on Monday (July 20) that Messi was not expected to make the trip back to Buenos Aires with most of the rest of the squad for what promises to be a subdued homecoming.

Some old photographs gather dust, some others gather meaning.

When Lionel Messi held a five-month-old Lamine Yamal during a charity calendar shoot around Christmas 2007, it was just another click. Nearly two decades on, it has become part of football folklore.

During Euro 2024, Yamal’s father Mounir Nasraoui shared the image with the caption: “The beginning of two legends.” What was probably a throwaway line then reads like prophecy now as the two gear up to face each other in the FIFA World Cup final.

Fans, pundits, players and coaches have all weighed in on the duo, and they all have the same opinion.

The parallels are hard to ignore. Messi scored his first World Cup goal when he was 18, wearing the No. 19 shirt. Twenty years later, Yamal did the same, at the same age and with the same jersey number! He is Barcelona’s youngest debutant and also the youngest goalscorer, breaking records that once belonged to Messi. The list goes on and on.

“For me, Messi is the greatest football player in history. He is a legend and I do not find myself worthy of being compared to him. I do not want to be Messi, and he knows it. I want to follow my own path,” Yamal once said.

Even so, it’s hard to miss how closely the teenager is tracing the trail Messi laid down, and doing it better than others who were hastily crowned the Argentine magician’s successor.

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Messi, now 39, is chasing one more piece of history, trying to make Argentina the first team since Brazil in 1962 to defend the World Cup. Up against him will be the 19-year-old Yamal, the face of a Spanish side hoping to lift the trophy for only the second time.

Spain once tried hard to convince Messi to play for La Roja, back when La Albiceleste was slow to notice him. That push peaked before the 2003 Under-17 World Cup where the Spaniards, featuring Messi’s La Masia teammate Cesc Fabregas, defeated the Argentines 3-2 in the semifinal. Fabregas netted a brace, including the match-winner. Jose Pekerman, the Argentine coach, revealed that the Spanish players during the post-match handshake told him: “If you had this kid (Messi), you would have been the champions.”

Messi, however, stayed loyal to Argentina, leaving behind the old question of what Spain might have looked like with him in the line-up. That fantasy will never play out. But in Yamal, Spain may have found something close to it.

The stage is now set for a generational showdown. One gladiator walks onto football’s grandest spectacle for the first time. The other, probably, for his last dance. Between them sits two decades, a stack of broken records and a photograph that has come to signify how destiny always plays a role in football.

The beautiful game brings these two together in the same frame once again, not as legend and heir but as opponents battling for the ultimate prize.