The most beautiful final of all time for the most unfair World Cup ever: the exploits of Messi and Mbappé do not erase the Infantino scandal | First page

It was written in the stars. It had to end like this, at the end of a match that goes right into the history of the World Cup and that of football. Modern or not. The final act of England ’66 and the Miracle of Bern ’54, Argentina West Germany 3-2 of Mexico ’86 are probably the only three matches comparable, in terms of emotional intensity and pace, to this Argentina-France that will be remembered by generations and generations even in 100 years. The strongest player of the modern era won it, winning the challenge in the challenge against his designated heir. Leo Messi finally sitting alongside the immortal Diego Maradona, but Kylian Mbappé proved on the night of the Lusail Stadium that he is the next champion ready to reach the elite. And enter, at the end of his career, the paradise of the eternals, such as Pelé, Cruijff, Maradona, Ronaldo the Phenomenon and from today Lionel da Rosario.

The most incredible epilogue on the right evening and at the end of an edition of the World Cup that had already written a new page in the legend for some time of this wonderful sport that is football. First time in an Arabic and Muslim speaking country, first time in the Emirates: an edition discussed and controversial as never before, from the day of its assignment (in 2012) to those of controversy and theindignation – perhaps never as strong as it should have been – for the many, too many, cases of deaths at work and exploitation to levels of slavery of those migrants arrived from the poorest areas of the world to build the stadiums that hosted the most important event that exists for any player, insider or simple fan in the last month. On the day when – 36 years after the last time – Argentina returns to the top of the world, we cannot and must not forget the act of extreme arrogance with which Gianni Infantino and Fifa allowed a competition like this to take place in a country absolutely insensitive to any respect for personal rights and freedom of expression.

Infantino has repeatedly reiterated the need to keep politics away from football, but there has been no more political act than denying the United States the World Cup in the last two editions, espousing the cause of Putin’s Russia first and then of Qatar – and let’s leave out the accusations, all to be proven, of the alleged corruption concocted and organized by the former French president Sarkozy to move votes that in 2012 seemed to hang on the other side of the ocean – and to avoid in any way speaking of the numerous distortions of this World Cup. The most beautiful final of all time, or in any case one of the most beautiful, he cannot make the stains produced by a machine of power and economics like Fifa disappear in one fell swoop, which has had everything at heart in the last thirty years (to be generous) except the beauty of football.