AL RAYYAN, Qatar — In a competition where games and fates are frequently determined by the finest of margins, and where those margins can feel agonizing and fraught—best to be avoided—two nations seem to have made themselves at home on the knife’s edge. It’s like they find strength in being inches from disaster.
“In this beautiful sport, even if you think you’ve sealed the game, you may get surprised again,” Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni said. ”I believe my team has the means, willingness, freshness and pride to face anything.”
Croatia captain Luka Modrić said, “We’ve shown mental strength and stability. … The most important thing is that we’re ready for anything.”
The first semifinal of this World Cup, to be played Tuesday night at Lusail Iconic Stadium, features the tournament’s two adroit high-wire acts—teams that are thriving despite tension, anticipation, noise or nail-biting plot twists. Argentina was favored to get this far but still took the difficult road. La Albiceleste fell to Saudi Arabia in one of the most shocking upsets in World Cup history, putting itself on the brink right away. Then they failed to look convincing against Mexico and in the round of 16 against Australia. As if that wasn’t enough tension, Argentina topped itself by blowing a late two-goal lead to the Dutch before winning Friday’s quarterfinal in a shootout so full of subplots and provocation that it’s already been dissected like the Zapruder film.
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Argentina turns every stadium it visits into a cauldron. No fan base here in Qatar has been more numerous, boisterous and desperate. It’s been 36 years since they celebrated their second star. Four World Cups featuring the great Lionel Messi have come and gone. The 35-year-old, now unencumbered by many of the flawed and unflattering comparisons to the late Diego Maradona, not to mention the excruciating international title drought that ended at last year’s Copa América, is on the tantalizing cusp of answering almost any lingering question about his place atop the sport’s pantheon. Every game and every shot is a new, increasingly intense emotion. It all feels like it’s now or never.
Croatia wasn’t expected to get this far—again. This modest nation of under four million people shocked the globe four years ago with its breathless, grueling, two-penalty-shootout-and-one-extra time gantlet to the World Cup final in Moscow, where they ran out of steam against rampant France. Much of Croatia’s team has changed since then.
“This is a new team with 18 players who weren’t here four and a half years ago, and they can’t be compared,” coach Zlatko Dalić said. “In 2018, we had a great generation that had played together for 10 years. They had their success and failures, and that culminated in Russia. Those players played at the biggest clubs. That’s not the case anymore. It’s a new generation that needs some time, and I think what this Croatia [is doing] is wonderful.”
The Vatreni have held the lead for a grand total of 46 minutes across five games in Qatar—all against Canada during the group stage. They’ve won once. Yet they’re in the semis because they’re practically impossible to beat. Croatia has won four straight shootouts over the past two World Cups. It outlasted Japan on penalties in last week's round of 16. And when trailing mighty Brazil toward the end of extra time in the quarters, Dinamo Zagreb forward Bruno Petković scored on Croatia’s only on-target shot, forcing the shootout.
“To be able to come back from 1–0 down against Brazil, in front of all their supporters, to break out of that trance, to manage to get back, to be calm, stable and to return to the match, that is truly something phenomenal,” Dalić said. “I think the Croatian team shows something that only a few other teams can show as well.”
It’ll be facing one of them at Lusail.
“They always favor [our opponents] and give them better odds,” Modrić said before the Brazil game. “We have shown many times when we play those kind of matches that the favorites don’t always win.”
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Croatia may not be the favorite, but it’s probably time to consider Modrić as one of—if not the—greatest winner(s) of his generation. In 2018, he broke the 10-year grip that the Messi–Cristiano Ronaldo duopoly held on the Ballon d’or and FIFA player of the year awards. And the 37-year-old hasn’t lost a step. He obviously doesn’t have the gaudy stats of those two or Robert Lewandowski, but he’s a peerless field general, a master of midfield influence with a knack for always delivering exactly what’s needed—all in a package that resembles the guy at your company’s help desk.
At this World Cup, Modrić leads the tournament in progressive passes and also is somehow tied for eighth in tackles. He connects, facilitates and motivates. Search for one of those videos of a deliriously happy Modrić circling the Real Madrid locker room, heartily congratulating every teammate and staffer following another match that Los Blancos inexplicably pulled out. It’s Modrić who’s the real constant in Madrid, to the tune of five Champions League crowns, four Club World Cups and three La Liga titles.
Against Brazil, Croatia forced the tiebreaker by matching the World Cup favorite in possession and then playing keep-away in the second half of extra time—against Brazil. It’s Modrić who’s driven Croatia forward, transforming the Vatreni into something more than a one-hit wonder. Consecutive trips to the final four for a country of Croatia’s size and pedigree is unprecedented.
“Luka Modrić is a true professional and a true gentleman in football boots,” Dalić said. “Love for football keeps finding its way back to him. It would be hard to find another 37-year-old playing at this level, carrying their national team the way he does. … But he we are, witnessing Luka Modrić at his best”
Scaloni agrees.
“It’s such a pleasure to see him play,” he said Monday. “He’s a role model for so many of us, not just because of his talent as a player but also his behavior.”
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Messi and Modrić transcend nationality. They’re icons who’ve earned support and sympathy from fans beyond their native borders—the number of Asian fans supporting Argentina because of Messi has been a popular story line of this World Cup. And they’re each, in their mid to late 30s, an inspirational anchor for evolving teams that derive their composure, strength and ability to withstand adversity from their legendary talismans.
Messi looks 35 here only in the most useful ways. He still moseys patiently around the field, surveying the opponent and picking his spots. But the burst and tight technique are definitely there, as is the sort of emotion, leadership and confidence that comes with age and experience. Messi has spoken more candidly here than we’ve been used to, and his fervor against the Dutch—the post-shootout confrontation with coaches Louis van Gaal and Edgar Davids, the viral “Qué mirás bobo?” (“What are you looking at, fool?”) aimed toward striker Wout Weghorst—suggest that Messi is reveling in the intensity of what he says is probably his last World Cup.
The emotions and responsibilities that came with playing for Argentina used to burden Messi. But times have changed. That Copa América win—Argentina’s first major international honor in almost three decades—paid off generations of debt. Now he’s been empowered to continue righting past wrongs, and it’s almost as if he’s been keeping track. Messi turned toward van Gaal on Friday night and cupped his ears in defiant celebration. Many thought it was an homage to Messi’s old friend and mentor Juan Román Riquelme, who often made the same gesture and was pushed out of Barcelona 20 years ago by none other than van Gaal. This tournament is a mission decades in the making.
Messi’s growing family has also offered a different perspective on playing for his country.
“They’re getting older. They understand better what’s going on and they enjoy it more,” he said last week of his three sons. “The rest of the family was with us before at other World Cups and Copa Américas and Thiago, the oldest of my children, was also there. But he wasn’t aware of what it means to be there, when it is a win or we go home. Now they are living it from inside and for me, it’s something spectacular. We are as excited as all Argentinians are.”
And then there’s the long shadow of Maradona, which Messi finally seems to have escaped thanks to his sustained excellence and the sustained devotion to Argentina that some once questioned. The song that’s become popular among Albiceleste fans here, a reworking of La Mosca Tsé-Tsé’s “Muchachos, Ahora Nos Volvimos a Ilusionar,” includes the lyrics, “Y al Diego en cielo lo podemos ver … alentandolo a Lionel. Muchachos, ahora nos volvimos a ilusionar.”
“And we can see Diego in heaven … cheering on Lionel. Boys, now we get excited again.”
There’s unity among Argentina’s fans, its two football icons and the current squad, which fought for each other against the Netherlands and which features only five of the 14 men who played in the ugly 3–0, group-stage loss to Croatia in 2018. Messi has four goals and two assists at this World Cup and appears to be a top candidate for the Golden Ball along with Kylian Mbappé, who’ll lead France against surprising Morocco in Wednesday’s second semi. But Messi’s statistical contributions, highlighted by his inexplicable first-half through ball to Nahuel Molina against the Dutch, comprise only part of his impact.
Midfielder Alexis Mac Allister spoke following the round-of-16 win about a tussle between Messi and Australia’s Aziz Behich that preceded Messi’s opener.
“Leo, when these things happen, he brings out that inner fire that he has, that personality that makes him even bigger than he is. In these kind of games, he becomes bigger,” Mac Allister said. “For us, he is the most important player. He knows it. He helps us a lot. … For me, he’s the best player in history, in the world, and I’m proud to be next to him.”
Messi and Modrić go back a ways, even further than their Clásico duels in Spain. On the day the future Croatian captain, then 20, made his international debut in a friendly against Argentina in Switzerland, Messi, then 18, scored his first senior international goal. Because that’s what Messi does—he’s now got 95. And Croatia came back from behind, winning that day with a 90th-minute goal—because that’s what Croatia does.
Now they’re connected again, one more time, taking their flawed but formidable teams on a wild roller coaster through Qatar and to the threshold of the final. Their places in history are secure, but the next week might enhance the winner’s reputation even further. A World Cup would be a glorious coda for Messi, the greatest of all time. And for Modrić, if any questions remain, lifting the World Cup should cement his status on that level just below.
It’ll be 90 minutes—but knowing these teams, probably 120, at least—to savior.
“If you love football, you want to see these players on the pitch,” Scaloni said.
