Messi does everything in nothing

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Leo Messi

is alone.

There are other footballers around him wearing the albiceleste shirt who run, sweat, get excited, try to help and, most importantly, do their best not to get in the way too much.

They are the same ones who come out behind him before the matches start, they sing, celebrate and are excited to be part of that solitary

-man race for the World Cup.

Messi does everything in nothing.

And that has already been enough to reach the quarter-finals of the tournament after leaving Australia on the road this time, whose hard-legged, physical football was not enough to wipe out one of the greatest players ever.

Someone who, at 35 years old and with effort management more present than ever, can spend half a game watching, taking very short steps, to end up taking out the shovel in the right place.

The half hour of the game had already passed.

's midfielders to

put inside balls.

looked more at his centrals than at the front.

only cared about the struggle.

, who has taken the place from Lautaro, had no one to see his uncheck.

And the

?

Yes, he replaced Di María.

But no sign of him.

But, just as in the second group game against Mexico as Argentina played with cataclysm after their opening loss to Arabia, Messi said enough is enough.

Reading the statistics, all of them monstrous (

played 1,000 games as a professional against Australia, with 789 goals scored), can match the feeling of exciting incomprehension that only Messi causes.

Because a disastrous control by

, because that was not an assist, much less a pass, it was the only preamble that Messi needed.

The origin of the episode, of course, was a lateral free kick thrown short by the

.

After a wall attempt and with Otamendi making a cameo in a movie that was not his, three Australian players went for Messi.

But he didn't even hit the ball hard.

He had enough to detect the corridor between all those legs, including those of the giant

, and give the ball a caress.

think of all this

?

He himself had already come across

and Argentina in 1993, looking for a place in the 1994 World Cup. And he was fascinated.

Although with the feeling that, beyond generating a memory, they could still have squeezed something more to an albiceleste who went hand in hand with a shadow, not Diego.

But, with this stubborn Messi in his last great challenge as a footballer, everything is difficult.

And Scaloni, beyond the fact that his Argentina's game in this World Cup is far from all preciosity, continues to interpret the story that he believes is his turn.

So it was not surprising that, five minutes after the start of the second half, he removed Papu from the field to reinforce his defense with a third center back (

).

As much as the

had not approached the vicinity of

until then .

The Argentines did not even want to put pressure on the Australians at the start, thus conserving strength for what could come against the Netherlands led by

in the quarterfinals.

It was a mistake.

With the ball circulating in slow motion around the field and the

acknowledging the blow, the bewilderment reached the most sensitive piece.

Goalkeeper

, after being bullied by De Paul, thought he could dribble out of there.

He did not succeed, and Julián Álvarez scored at will.

What nobody expected is that Australia, on their first kick, would close the gap because Enzo Fernández went looking for a shot from

and slipped the ball into his own goal.

And the tie would have come ten minutes from the end if Lisandro had not arrived in time to stop

, about to score one of the goals in World Cup history between endless dribbles and breaks.

Messi was the only one who responded.

He left Lautaro alone twice.

One shot to the clouds, and the other against Ryan.

And in the last play of the night, Emiliano Martínez had to stop a

shot that took the match into extra time.

Success has never had so much to do with drama.

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