Another World Cup?! Anything is possible for GOAL50 winner Lionel Messi: The miracle-worker still defying logic with Argentina and Inter Miami

Lionel Messi was "counting down the days" until the start of the 2022 World Cup. He was so excited. But nervous too. Argentina were on a 36-game unbeaten run but that had only intensified the pressure on the recently crowned Copa America winners and their talismanic captain, who admitted on the eve of the tournament, "We are a little scared because we want it to go well."

Truth be told, though, Messi needed it to go well. His World Cup legacy was on the line. Granted, he had lifted the Golden Ball at the 2014 tournament in Brazil but it was a pyrrhic victory after the most frustrating of final defeats to Germany.

Messi's inability to deliver in the biggest game in football was used as a stick with which to undermine his claim on the title of the greatest of all time, evidence that he could not be considered in the same class as Diego Maradona or Pele.