Argentina do this. They keep doing this. England led for the best part of an hour in Atlanta, Anthony Gordon's second-half finish separating the sides, and with under 10 minutes left at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium they could all but see the final. Then Lionel Messi decided otherwise.
The 39-year-old did not score. He did everything else. His pass released Enzo Fernandez to level from distance, a clean strike that beat Jordan Pickford and silenced an England side who, until then, had been the better team. One apiece, and the night had turned in a heartbeat.
The winner was crueller still. Alexis Mac Allister's shot cannoned back off the post, Messi was quickest to the loose ball, and his cross hung just long enough for Lautaro Martinez to rise and head it home. Inside the closing five minutes, England's evening fell apart.
The hour that flattered to deceive
For an hour Thomas Tuchel had it right. England were compact, dangerous on the break, and Gordon's goal, taken around the 55th minute, had a deserved, settled feel to it. They led. They were minutes from the biggest night in their modern history, a first World Cup final since 1966.
That is what makes the ending sting. This was not a side hanging on by its fingertips. England were winning, and comfortably enough, right up until the moment the game slipped. A defence that had held firm all night simply stopped holding when it mattered most, and Argentina, sensing blood, went for the throat.
Pickford could do little about either goal. Enzo's strike was too clean, Lautaro's header too well placed. There was no late reprieve this time, only the sight of the champions doing what champions keep doing.
Messi, from deep
He is 39 now and no longer runs a match. He decides one instead. Messi's two assists were the difference in Atlanta: the pass that teed up Enzo, then the composure to seize on Mac Allister's rebound and pick out Lautaro when a lesser player might have snatched at the chance.
There is something almost routine about it now. These Argentina find the decisive moment when a knockout demands one, and more often than not it runs through their captain. England had the better of the first hour and still came away empty. That is the price of playing the champions.
The header belonged to the striker. The night belonged to the captain. Argentina, the 2022 winners, have turned the late comeback into a habit, and Lionel Scaloni's side found another one exactly when the tournament asked for it.
For England, the questions write themselves. Tuchel's side have folded in the closing stretch before, and they did it again on the grandest stage available to them, a semi-final won and then lost inside five minutes.
Champions march on, England to Miami
Argentina go through to a second successive World Cup final. Spain, 2-0 winners over France in the first semi-final, await at MetLife Stadium on 19 July.
England go the other way. A third-place play-off in Miami on 18 July is all that is left of a summer that had promised so much more, and Tuchel must somehow lift a squad that came within touching distance of the final and walked away with nothing. It is a fixture nobody in white will have wanted, three days after the cruellest of nights.
Argentina keep finding a way. England, once again, are left to wonder how they let one slip.
Sources
- Yahoo Sports
- NBC News
- ESPN
- NBC Miami
- Cover photo: YantsImages / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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