Qatar 2022 Doha
After 63 matches played over the last 29 days, the curtain comes down on the 2022 Fifa Qatar World Cup Sunday when familiar foes France and Argentina meet in the final at the 88,000-seat Lusail Stadium from 6pm.
Both teams will be looking to write their history.
France will want to become only the third team in the history of the World Cup to retain their title after Brazil in 1962 and Italy in 1938.
Argentina will be chasing after their third world title after triumphing on home soil in 1978 and in Mexico 1986.
France or Argentina will also become the third most successful nation at the World Cup with three titles after Brazil (five) and Italy and Germany (four).
Everyone is also talking about how this should be Lionel Messi’s World Cup that will fittingly crown his story as perhaps the greatest football player of all time.
France will obviously want nothing to do with this train of thought.
“People wanting Messi to win the World Cup does not bother me. I have no stress. We are composed and focused. Our objective is to be world champions again and we will do everything possible to achieve our objectives,” Les Bleus coach Didier Deschamps said here on Saturday.
Deschamps will also be chasing his own history of becoming only the second coach to retain the World Cup after Italy’s Vittorio Pozzo in 1938. In fact, Pozzo is the only coach to have won two World Cup titles.
Fans have been urged to be in the stadium by 4.30pm for the closing ceremony which Fifa has promised will be ‘stunning’.
The final ceremony will last 15 minutes and will be themed around the world coming together for the 29 days of the tournament through poetry and music.
Onto the serious business, France will have been grappling with a selection headache after several players fell ill in their camp including Raphael Varane, Ibrahima Konate, Dayot Upamecano and Adrien Rabiot.
Deschamps said they were managing the situation as best as they could and as far as he was concerned he had a squad of 24 from which to pick his starting line-up.
Les Bleus are on a 10-match unbeaten run against South American teams at the World Cup.
Remarkably, France’s last loss to South American opposition at the World Cup was against Argentina, 2-1, in the group stages way back in 1978 in Buenos Aires.
They defeated three South American nations en route to their 2018 success, including Argentina 4-3 in the round of 16 in Kazan, where they came from behind to win with two Kylian Mbappe’s goals.
Mbappe will once again lead the formidable French attack in Lusail that also has the countries all-time leading scorer Olivier Giroud.
Mbappe is the tournament’s joint top scorer with five goals, same as Messi, who will also achieve the milestone of being the player who has featured in most matches at the World Cup, 26, if he plays on Sunday.
Argentina can also count on in-form Manchester City forward Julián Álvarez, who has scored four goals in Qatar, including a brilliant individual effort against Croatia in their semi-final.
This promises to be a fascinating contest between two giants of the game hell-bent on being crowned world champions.
Polish referee Szymon Marciniak will handle the match.
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