Four fascinating football arcs

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This article was published 12/07/2024 (438 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A teenage phenom. The legend he hopes to emulate. A washed-up Golden Boot winner. His country’s darling-turned scapegoat-turned genius.

Four individuals, four storylines, four fascinating arcs. Together, they form a narrative that describes in almost-retrospect the pair of tournaments set to conclude on this weekend’s Championship Sunday.

Individually, they tell of the youth, the lore, the rejuvenation and the stubbornness that reveal a life’s story on a single day, in a single game.

Or, in this case, two of them. And about as big as they come.

Spain have surprised no one in making the final of Euro 2024. England? It’s complicated. A continent away, Argentina have been doing Argentina things. The World Cup winners were always favoured to lift a second consecutive Copa America, but in Colombia they’ll be facing unlikely finalists who have probably played the best football of the summer.

But given that the Euros are up first (2 p.m., TSN), we’ll start there.

Lamine Yamal

Saturday is Lamine Yamal’s birthday. His 17th. Four days ago, he became the youngest men’s footballer to score in a major international knockout match, beating a record set by Pelé at the 1958 World Cup.

Like that Pelé goal in Brazil’s semi-final with France, Yamal’s strike for Spain against the same opponent will imprint itself on the sport’s collective memory as we come to realize the magnitude of what he’s done.

Freeze-frame the buildup, and in the moments before his left foot hits the ball, he’s facing a box of four French players and a distance of at least 25 yards. Un-freeze, and his spectacular, in-curling shot is zipping towards the top corner of the far side of the net. Incidentally, he scored a similar goal at last year’s UEFA U-17 Championship as a 15-year-old, also against France.

Spain might be anchored by one of world football’s top midfielders in Rodri, and with six players aged 30 or older, manager Luis de la Fuente’s squad is more experienced than it is youthful. In Yamal and attacking teammate Nico Williams, La Roja also possess a pair of blue-chippers too young to have suffered defeat at this level, and perhaps too good to do it now.

Lionel Messi

The parallels are unfair. They’re also eerie.

Lionel Messi first registered in the global football consciousness as a 17-year-old at the 2005 FIFA U-20 World Cup. (Yamal wouldn’t be born for another two years.) He’d already made his debut for Barcelona, and at 18 years old he had 24 games in La Liga and a World Cup campaign under his belt.

Yamal, also of Barcelona, has already played 51 times for his club side and is a win away from winning a continental title. His career arc isn’t only following Messi’s, but beginning at an even greater angle. That said, he can still only dream of emulating his predecessor, now 37 and universally regarded as the greatest player in history.

Nineteen months after capping a mountain of achievements with a World Cup, Messi can win the Copa America for a second time in a row with an Argentina triumph over Colombia in Sunday’s later kick-off (7 p.m., TSN).

Fascinatingly, he’s done little on the scoresheet these last few weeks in the United States, and yet the tournament has centred on him more than any other figure. A sort of carnival follows La Albiceleste wherever they go – part celebrity spectacle and part celebration of a sporting marvel who now exists as much in the imagination as he does on the pitch.

It’s perhaps a compliment to Canada that his solitary goal and assist this summer came against them.

James Rodriguez

On a purely football level, Messi and everyone else at the 2024 Copa America has been put in the shadow by the reignited James Rodriguez.

Ten years ago, the 22-year-old James lit up the World Cup in Brazil by scoring six goals — enough to win him the Golden Boot. He tallied twice for Colombia against Uruguay in the round of 16 and once in a quarterfinal loss to the competition hosts. Later that summer he turned his performances for Los Cafeteros into a big-money move to Real Madrid.

Unfortunately, his arc seemed to take a steep dive in subsequent years, and by 2020 he was toiling at Everton. He’s presently at Sao Paulo, where he’s hardly impressed.

It’s not exactly out of nowhere then — but certainly out of the quite distant past — that the now 33-year-old, who celebrated his birthday on Friday, has roared into this Copa, delivering exquisite set-pieces and working as the creative engine on a Colombia team that has played the best football of any team in either of the two ongoing tournaments.

Quietly, manager Nestor Lorenzo has been building a side that’s gone unbeaten for more than two years. James is integral to it, and he’ll want to show everyone just how far he’s come back when he faces Messi and Argentina in Sunday’s final.

Gareth Southgate

Remember the “It’s Coming Home” waistcoat?

During the 2018 World Cup, England manager Gareth Southgate’s Marks & Spencer waistcoat somehow stitched itself to the “It’s Coming Home” phenomena of a first championship since 1966 to produce a fun, quirky fashion-slogan mash-up.

Football did not come home that summer, but in making the semifinal the Three Lions came closer than they had in a generation. Then, at Euro 2020, they progressed as far into a tournament as possible without winning the trophy, losing on penalties to Italy in the Wembley final.

England are once again in the Euro final, although you’d hardly know it — what with the criticism Southgate took until Wednesday’s 2-1 come-from-behind win over the Netherlands. Called out by pundits at home, and booed by the travelling supporters in Germany, England slogged through the group stage before squeaking past Slovakia and needing penalties to overcome Switzerland.

Southgate, stubbornly refusing to alter a lopsided formation and ineffective tactics, bore the brunt of the vitriol. Instead of caving to it, however, he mostly stuck with his set-up – although replacing Trent Alexander-Arnold with Kobbie Mainoo – and was finally rewarded with an exceptional, whistle-to-whistle performance against the Dutch.

Suddenly, mere days after calls for his exit, the Football Association is hoping he’ll stay on for the 2026 World Cup cycle.

A lopsided defeat to Spain in Berlin could put Southgate out of favour once again, but at this point he has a lineup he trusts, that he’s stubbornly stuck with and that, even when playing poorly, has been somehow impossible to beat.

Of course, England have yet to face Yamal. It’s incredible to think that those latest strains of “It’s Coming Home” could be squelched by a player who was 16-years-old just Friday.

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