Battle for the golden boot at the World cup
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Who are the main contenders for the Golden Boot at this World Cup?
Now, as the World Cup heats up and we start getting into the final games in the round of 48, Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe, Erling Haaland and Ronaldo are in an epic tussle to be the top goalscorers. The first World Cup since 1954, where three players have scored four or more times after only two matches. To discuss all this, I'm joined now by Miguel Delaney, Chief Football Writer at The Independent, who's at the World Cup. South American football correspondent with the BBC, Tim Vickery, and I'm joined by Gary Spain. He's an Ireland superfan who's getting to see more than 20 World Cup games. 20! You're all very welcome. Good morning to you. Tim, I might start with you first. Lionel Messi is now the World Cup's all-time leading scorer after getting two goals for Argentina against Austria a day before his 39th birthday.
How does he still do it?
No, it is extraordinary, isn't it? Especially as of these 18 World Cup goals, 12 of them have come after his 35th birthday. The man is a phenomenon. It is the highlight of what I ludicrously call my career to have seen him right at the start before anyone else. I saw the whole thing first when he was a little 17-year-old playing for Argentina under 20s. He owes it all to you. He does, yeah. I've been trying to claim credit for a long, long time. I'm still waiting for the cheques. You looked at him and you wouldn't give him anything. Look at him, he's half as high as anyone else. Little pigeon-toed runt of a litter. And as soon as he got on the ball, we all knew we were in the presence of something very, very special indeed.
And it's been such a privilege and an honour to follow it. But I never imagined when I saw him, this is the start of 2005, and I was blown away by him. I never imagined that this little man would still be part of my life 21 and a half years later.
And he's such a key figure for Argentina. I presume the worry would be, particularly given his age, that if he gets injured, they might have a problem. Do they function without him?
They have learned to function without him. Some of their best performances have come in his absence. Last year, they beat Brazil 4-1. Probably the best performance of the entire Scaloni years, these nearly eight years in which Scaloni has been in charge. And I actually think that's one of the reasons that he decided that he would play this World Cup. He kept us in suspense right up until the final moment. Will I? Won't I? Can I do myself justice? But I think it helps enormously because the team basically is Messi and his fan club.
How has Lionel Messi maintained his scoring prowess at 39?
But his fan club have grown up and they have learned to play without him if need be. They don't want that necessity to come about. But if it does, they are prepared for it. And I think that eases the burden on Lionel Messi himself.
I suppose the only comparable figure in Argentinian football history is Maradona, is he?
Yes, although they're such different people, aren't they? Maybe Messi is a kind of Maradona for the PlayStation generation. Maradona is... So was so emotional, so linked. I mean, the Argentine population could see so much of themselves in him and the way that he would fall down and get up again and fall down and get up again. With Messi, there's none of that. With Messi, remember that he grew up abroad. He went to Barcelona at the age of 13. So with Messi, there's a kind of distance from him. And that was a problem for a while. But now I think that distance, because he's been so successful with the national team, because the national team has been his priority for the last seven or eight years, I think now that distance has become a kind of reverence.
Ever since they won the World Cup in Qatar, it's almost been as if they're on an extended lap of honor. And this World Cup, where in the past Argentina have gone into World Cups as champions on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Oh, we're going to lose our status. It's going to be taken away from us. This time, obviously, they want to win. But this time it's also part of a kind of lap of honour. Let's celebrate him for the last time.
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