It was a very good World Cup. Quite possibly one of the best and certainly one of the best finals, even though it took France 80 minutes to turn up. A bit like the FA Cup Final of 1979, excitement at the end makes for more tension. On that occasion 3 of the 5 goals came in the last 5 minutes, Manchester United coming from two goals down against Arsenal only to concede at the death. This time Kylian Mbappe woke from his slumbers to pull France level with two goals in the last 10 minutes and then produced a third equaliser in the second half of extra time. With chances at both ends at the end of normal and extra time either team could have won this year's World Cup final. It's rare a head to head clash between two iconic players actually turns into a battle royal between them - with Messi and Mbappe it did.
Messi now has his World Cup win to go with last year's Copa America, his first tournament win for Argentina. And yes, of course it was me who said a month ago that Argentina wouldn't win it because "Messi is aging and fading and anyway he never turns up for world cups". It wasn't just me who found Messi underwhelming in the big tournaments. Until 2021 many Argentina fans doubted him, contrasting his meek demeanour with the bombastic Diego Maradona and calling him pecho frio (cold chest). They felt he gave more for his club than his country.
But Messi smashed it, becoming the first player to score in all four knock out rounds at a finals (five players have done it when there were fewer rounds). It wasn't just that his team won and he scored goals - after all Cruyff's Holland didn't win the trophy, but he had a material and unforgettable impact on tournaments in a way that Messi hadn't until the last two years.
Something has obviously happened to Messi in the last year and a bit. I'm sure I wasn't the only one surprised to read that, immediately after Argentina had triumphed on penalties in a tetchy clash with with Netherlands, Messi broke off from a TV interview to say to a passing Dutch player, live on air, "What are you looking at you fool? What are you looking at you fool? Go on, bugger off!" Not so pecho frio then! Maybe it was his desperation to win things with his country in the twilight of his outstanding career. Maybe it's because he wasn't with Barca anymore and these competitions provided his best chance of glory. Or maybe he'd just had three Shredded Wheat. (Unlike Maradona there's no suspicion of anything stronger). Whatever, he has been more focussed, determined and far more productive than ever before in the pale blue and white striped shirt. I had one in the late 70s and loved wearing it at training even though I was more Otamendi than Kempes. Nevertheless, the Argentinian team in recent decades has been harder to warm to and their behaviour against the Dutch was unedifying (see picture, immediately after the penalty shoot out).
It had been a feisty game, with a huge ruck breaking out after one of the Argies hacked down a Dutchman near the touchline and then lashed the ball off the pitch, hard and in the general direction of the Dutch substitutes, who piled on in outrage:
The Argie got a yellow card for the tackle but I'd have been tempted to give him two on the spot, the second for kicking the ball away. This is a slightly grey area in the rules, the general thought being that the yellow card is a caution, so a warning about future behaviour and it's therefore not appropriate to issue two in the same passage of play. However, Northern Ireland's Chris Baird got two in short order in 2015, both for fouls, the ref playing advantage for the first of them. Northern Ireland appealed the decision claiming it was wrong but the International Football Association Board said it was correct. Now I don't really believe in FIFA conspiracies but the ref, Spaniard Antonio Lahoz, was never going to send the Argentinian lad off, if only because he probably wants to continue as a FIFA international referee. Neverthless he still got "released from the tournament" after the match - for dishing out too many yellow cards (14). I'm pretty sure most of them were fully justified, but I'd like to have seen a fifteenth, to puncture the vaunting ego of Aston Villa's Argentine goalie, Emilio Martinez, who has taken goalkeeper antics in penalty shoot outs to a whole new and rather belligerent level. He was given a yellow in the shoot out after the fourth penalty though he could well have been booked for throwing the ball away before France's second, which was missed and turned out to be the key moment. Don't get me wrong, Martinez is a really good keeper and he played well for his country throughout the tournament, pulling off a critical save in the dying seconds of extra time in the final else France might have won it. But I don't need to like the guy. It also would have been amusing: if a goalkeeper gets two yellows in a shoot out he's off and no subs are allowed so one of his outfield team mates has to go in goal. Given Lahoz had already upset his masters he might as well have gone the whole hog.
Although the refereeing in the tournament was far from faultless I thought much of it was good. I was pleased to see the refs allowing a bit more physical contact and dishing out fewer yellow cards. As a result there was more energy and bite in many of the games. However, England correctly felt hard done by about the Brazilian ref failing to give a free kick for a foul on Saka soon before France scored their first goal. I'm not sure how this got past VAR; it was an obvious mistake. And, while it might have spoiled the spectacle, I'd have laughed fit to burst if either the Argie goalie or outfield player had got two yellows against the Dutch.
One thing I did notice was an awful lot of toes being stamped on. Given how much care players take in challenging these days and the amazing degree of control they have over their bodies I doubt this is accidental. Contact above the ankle always risks a yellow card these days but you don't see players booked for stamping on toes. It's the modern version of the "reducer", a tackle designed to take the zip out of a nippy player. Stephen Pienaar suffered a lot of these at Everton, though in those days it was studs down the achilles. Just the job to slow down someone who can normally accelerate quickly from a standing start.
Best goals? I liked the equalising goal for Netherlands against Argentina by Weghorst (yes, he who just looked a big galoot at Burnley) from a crafty free kick, though I'd have been very upset if any team I played in had been slack enough to concede it. Argentina's second in the final, scored by Di Maria from a sweeping move with a small but vital contribution from Messi, was a thing of beauty, even if I think he scuffed the finish. No, I don't think he meant to hit it into the ground so it bounced up over the keeper: look at him straining just to reach the cross. Still a great goal. I loved Richarlison's acrobatic bicycle kick against Serbia that won goal of the tournament but my favourite was his goal against Korea where he juggled the ball three times on his head then twice with his feet before laying it off and making a "third man" run into the box (sorry for the coaching jargon) and taking a delicate touch before finishing sweetly when the ball was returned to him via Marquinhos and Thiago Silva. The Independent called it the most aesthetically pleasing goal of the tournament up to that point. It was, but while the teenage winger in me swooned over the goal, the either side of 30 centre back muttered "you can't let him start doing that near the box, you've got to barge him over". Though I'm glad the Koreans didn't have the gumption to do it. And no, I didn't mind the Brazilian dancing: samba really is their culture. I'd have liked to have seen more of it and was very disappointed when they went out, with Neymar sitting waiting for the glory of taking the final penalty that he never got to take. His goal in the game was another thing of beauty though.
You could see why the standard in the Premier League is so high - wherever you looked there were players from its clubs and by no means mainly from the "top" clubs. As well as Villa's Martinez, Brighton's Argentine Alexis Mac Allister took the eye but there were many others.
The funniest bit of punditry was Eni Aluko saying that Richarlison had got 19 goals in 40 games for his country: "you do the math on that, that's one goal a game pretty much". Understandably it was all over social media. Eluko, who has a first class law degree and a doctorate as well as 102 international caps probably meant to say a goal every other game. There was some horrible stuff on social media which I don't defend but come on, Eni, it was funny, if only for keeping up the stereotype that all footballers are thick. Hopefully she'll be able to laugh about it in the future.
My favourite bit of pundit stupidity was Graeme Souness on the Japan-Spain game. At half time he was purring about the Spanish. "Why can't England play like that?" after lots of keep ball got them a single goal lead. But it's only one-nil Graeme! They then went three halves of football and 30 minutes of extra time without scoring a goal before lamely going out. In the second half of that game we had the remarkable incident of the ball over the line or still in play debate when Japan equalised and then went on to win. Souness was adamant the ball was out and saw all sorts of FIFA conspiracies because few VAR stills were shown at the time. I imagine there was simply a lot of what the cricket third umpire calls "rock and rolling" as they went between sequential images. Quite why he thought they'd favour Japan over Spain I'm not sure. Now every schoolboy knows all the ball has to be over all of the line. Souness kept saying you could see grass but if it's under the shadow of the ball it's still in. Oddly the pundits seem to get this for goals rather than an everyday out of play; they imagine looking down perpendicularly from the crossbar. To be fair to Souness, just about every Premier League assistant referee would have flagged it out: I've always thought that they're far too quick to put the flag up for ball out of play.
The other reason this incident appealed to me was that, while every schoolboy knows that all of the ball etc, I discovered when playing for my school that no teacher knew that the line of the quadrant at the corner flag forms part of the quadrant. Just like a foul on the line of the penalty area is a penalty because it's part of the area. I used to take a lot of corners and to a man teacher-linesmen made me put the ball "inside" the quadrant. To be fair, football league linesmen of the day generally did the same. But this was more of a nuisance to me as the line was rarely drawn properly - school groundsmen were equally ignorant (or not arsed). Instead of a quarter circle it was often a straight diagonal line barely half of the yard size it's meant to be, meaning the ball was practically touching the corner flag; very offputting. Of course I argued the toss every time, never to any avail but my name isn't Phil for nothing*. This law of the game has never changed but the interpretation of it now makes logical sense. I like to think that all those idiots I argued with watch international players placing the ball just shadowing the line these days and scream at the TV that "it's not in the quadrant!" Dickheads. Like Souness.
The contrast of styles on show was refreshing after watching so many Premier League teams all trying to play like Manchester City. Watching the high energy of Japan, the amazingly solid defence of Morroco coupled with brave and intelligent breaks and the possession game of Spain and Germany was fascinating. I didn't hear Souness saying "why can't England play like that" after Spain got dumped out by Morocco: loads of the ball and not a clue what to do with it. One of my favourite players in the tournament was the Canadian born Moroccan keeper Bono (that's what's on his shirt but his name is actually Bounou) who made many good saves and did well in the penalty shoot out against Spain. Not like Martinez though, nothing underhand. Just rocking and stepping from side to side, starting to go one way during the kicker's run then going the other and then maybe the first way - or maybe not. I always think keepers should stand up as long as possible, especially against those likely to roll it the other way after they commit. (Apparently this is also what the England team psychologists think). Sure if they lash it very hard towards any of the four corners then it won't be saveable - but it wouldn't be anyway. And it forces the kicker to take the risk of doing what Harry Kane did against France. It's harder taking penalties than it looks.
Bono also provided my favourite non-footballing moment of the tournament, being interviewed while holding his young child - who thought the mic was a lollipop and, after poking it, tried to lick it.
What else did we learn? 1. The BBC seem to have figured out that Alex Scott is far better at asking questions than answering them; Gary Lineker may have a successor when he's ready to play more golf. 2. While the Phil Foden media fan club was in full voice, the Trent Alexander Arnold lobby stayed shtum after Kyle Walker kept Kylian Mbappe quiet. It makes sense to build your team round a no 10 but not a no 2. (To be fair most of us knew this already). With Walker I thought we had a 50-50 chance in that match. 3. FIFA can't even be trusted to quote attendance figures, stating that half empty stadia were at capacity. 4. Extra time had been thought to be a waste of time and many thought matches should go straight to penalties if level after 90 minutes. The final proved it is worthwhile - with modern fitness levels and all those subs there's plenty of energy. Yes, some teams seemed to settle for penalties but generally there was excitement in the games that went to extra time. 5. England fans know how to behave in countries with strict laws: no arrests at all. Some said this was because of no alcohol in the stadia but there were only 3 English fans arrested in Russia in 2018. And no sign of bum flare man from the Euros in 2021:
But there was fan misbehaviour from the fans of some countries, with many turning up ticketless, causing crushes and trying to get into stadia. About the only bad publicity I saw for the Qatari organisation were comments about "chaotic crowd control". I guess the Arab and African nations have lots of role models but such situations are inherently frought with danger (and far from unprecedented in Africa).
Meanwhile, as nations such as England and Germany irritated their Middle Eastern friends with their po-faced attitudes, ridiculous armbands and covered mouths, FIFA got on with having plenty of visible female match officials, including the first woman ref at a finals, which probably sent a far bigger message than any armband. Not all bad by FIFA, then.
David Walsh in the Sunday Times commended FIFA for taking the tournament to the Middle East, with the obvious reservations. Saudi Arabia's victory over Argentia and Morocco's exploits in getting to the semis will be talked about in many countries of the region for a long time. The support for the Arab nations other than Qatar was very tangible watching on TV. I accept it's good to take the tournament to new countries but few have the financial resources of Qatar to host it. There was a plus for fans (and Gianni Infantino) in having the tournament based in such a geographically confined area in being able to travel easily between venues.
Gareth Southgate has correctly garnered a lot of praise for England's performances in recent tournaments. He now has more tournament wins than any other England manager and with 6 tournament knock out wins has as many as all previous England managers put together over the last 48 years. He's a fine people manager and it's difficult to think of others who would have handled the controversies over issues like taking the knee and Qatar and Russia as host nations as well as he has. The thing that impresses me the most is that, after he's been in post for 6 years, we had one of the youngest squads in the tournament. Alex Ferguson used to think six years was the lifespan of a team, but Southgate has continued to astutely evolve his squad throughout his tenure.
So I'm pleased he has decided to carry on for another tournament. He is almost certainly doing the defining job of his career. He was clearly shaken by the stick he took for poor results in the summer, but that goes with the territory and surely it's best for him to risk his term ending in a big failure rather than never knowing what might have been. Plenty of time for an upstairs job at the F.A. later.
The reason I suggest an FA job would be more appropriate than a club manager's role is the one doubt I have over his management. I don't think he always sets the team up optimally for the opposition and he generally doesn't respond quickly enough in making personnel and tactical changes. When he does make changes it's often like for like, which doesn't pose the other team new problems. For example, against the USA when we were being pressed and outnumbered in midfield he brought on Henderson for Bellingham when I was calling for a forward to be sacrificed for an extra midfielder or maybe Phil Foden to get more control. He selected Foden for the next game against Wales (arguably the media selected Foden by general acclaim!) but for all of the goal-less first half I was wondering why he had Foden on the right and Rashford on the left. Mrs H will vouch that I must have muttered half a dozen times "switch them over". Yes, Rashford prefers the left but he is fine on either side, whereas Foden has played very few of his games for Man City on the right. Apparently the logic was Foden would be on the same side of the pitch as his club mates Stones and Walker, ditto Rashford with Shaw. Within minutes of switching them over at half time both had scored.
When you see the decisiveness of some other managers making substitutions (for example, France made two before half time in the final) it makes me wonder about Gareth. In team selection he probably felt he had to start Foden against France but I thought that Kounde, a centre back filling in at right back, would have been much less comfortable against the pace of Rashford or Saka. Indeed we saw in the final how Argentina ruthlessly exposed Kounde against Di Maria, forcing the French winger Dembele to come back defend (badly). They also covered very effectively for Messi's inability to cover as much ground: Man City's Alvarez ran himself into the ground before being substituted. It's very much a young man's game these days but some players are worth covering for.
One thing we didn't get to see was Spain v Wales. Listening to radio commentary of a Spain match I couldn't understand why they were referring to the Welsh left back, Neco Williams. Until I realised Spain has a winger called Nico Williams. Head to head, winger and full back with the same name, that would have been a commentator's nightmare.
P.S. Now that Messi has definitively answered his doubters I have two remaining questions in my mind about him. Why is he known as Leo, not Lio? But is he now the GOAT? Well not for me, but that stuff is just an opinion anyway
* I only realised the other day that "philippic" is a word. To save anyone who doesn't know the word having to look it up it means a bitter attack or denunciation, especially a verbal one. Synonyms are given as rant, tirade, diatribe and invective. I'm rather surprised no-one has ever pointed this out to me. It's named after Demosthenes's denuncuation of Philip II of Macedon (Alexander the Greek's dad) in 350BC. I assume verbal above means oral - I remember a pedantic colleague challenging an agenda item as a "verbal report" which meant there was no paper so it was going to be presented orally. How else would he report it if not in words? he asked. In binary?
The Independent piece in praise of Richarlison's goal against Korea is at https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/world-cup/richarlison-goal-brazil-south-korea-b2239422.html
David Walsh's column Decades from now we will remember the upsets in Qatar and how FIFA came good on its promise to grown the game in a new part of the world was in the Sunday Times on 4 December 2022
