Yamal faces Messi in World Cup final after photo together as a baby resurfaces

Lamine Yamal and Lionel Messi will face each other in the World Cup final at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey on Sunday — a match made stranger by a 2007 Barcelona charity calendar photo in which a 20-year-old Messi gently bathed a baby in a plastic tub. That baby was Yamal. His family had won a UNICEF raffle. Nobody thought about the image again for 17 years.

Both players came through La Masia. Both wore the No. 19 at Barcelona before switching to the 10. The symmetry has long since stopped feeling like coincidence.

The two teams are just as compelling as the two stars. Spain and Argentina have met only once at a World Cup — a 1966 group-stage game Argentina won 2-1 — and have never faced each other in a knockout match. The all-time series is level at six wins apiece. A planned Finalissima in March was called off, meaning the reigning European and South American champions will meet in a World Cup final for the first time in history.

Spain arrived here by dismantling France 2-0, making the tournament’s most feared attack look ordinary. Theirs is the clearest tactical identity in the sport: a possession-based structure that still looks unmistakably like Spain in an era of tactical homogeneity. Lamine Yamal has scored just once all tournament — back on matchday two — yet his influence has been constant. Mikel Oyarzabal leads the team in goals and buried the penalty that eliminated France. Rodri has conducted the midfield with the authority of a reigning Ballon d’Or winner. At the back, Pau Cubarsí and Aymeric Laporte have conceded once in seven matches, Unai Simón has set a World Cup clean sheet record, and the fullbacks have been exceptional at both ends — Marc Cucurella erased Kylian Mbappé for 90 minutes, while Pedro Porro scored the decisive third.

Argentina’s route to the final has been far messier. They beat Cape Verde 3-2, Egypt 3-2, Switzerland 3-1 in extra time, and England 2-1 after trailing in the 85th minute. No team had ever scored multiple stoppage-time winners in a single World Cup tournament before this Argentina side. At some point the word “lucky” gives way to “inevitable”.

Driving it all is a 39-year-old. Messi assisted both goals against England and has scored eight times in the tournament, rewriting record books with each passing round. His legs have aged; his reading of the game has not.

The tactical tension is straightforward: Spain want structure and control, Argentina want space and chaos. Whoever imposes their preferred game on Sunday will lift the trophy. The subplot — the greatest player of all time against the teenager widely tipped to succeed him, with photographic evidence that Messi held him first — writes itself.