Хөлбөмбөгийн дэлхийн аварга шалгаруулах тэмцээний аваргын төлөөх тоглолт

Finals do not get more mouthwatering than this.

On one side, you have the most complete, cohesive team in the tournament, with a 19-year-old superstar in their ranks in Lamine Yamal. On the other, a nation led by the best player in the history of the sport in Lionel Messi — now 39, but still capable of deciding the biggest matches almost single-handedly.

Sunday’s World Cup final will be contested by Spain and Argentina, and there are narratives to be unpacked all over the pitch.

Spain arrive in a men’s World Cup final for only the second time, after their victory in the 2010 edition, with a squad who could match the glory of that generation — and a playing style that is not dissimilar from their golden era. Argentina are in their seventh FIFA final, only Germany/West Germany (eight) have played in more, as they look to retain their world title four years on from that incredible game against France in Qatar, where they won on penalties after a 3-3 draw.

After 103 matches played in an expanded 48-team format over five weeks, just two nations remain.

This is The Athletic’s definitive data and tactical preview of the 2026 World Cup final.

It feels laughable to think that Spain’s tournament-winning credentials were questioned after their opening game.

A goalless draw with first-time qualifiers Cape Verde back on June 15 felt like an embarrassment to the European champions at the time, but a stubborn defensive block and an inspired goalkeeping performance from 40-year-old Vozinha managed to keep them at bay, despite their 27 shots and 74 per cent share of possession.

It has proved to be the only blot on an otherwise flawless World Cup page for Luis de la Fuente’s side, who are yet to fall behind at this tournament and have only conceded one goal in their seven matches — in the quarter-final against Belgium.

Spain’s possession-dominance is deeply ingrained in their nation’s football culture. No player exemplifies that more than the captain, Rodri, whose 655 completed passes are more than any other player in a World Cup finals since records began in 1966.

Centre-back team-mate Pau Cubarsi ranks second on 550 completed passes. More impressively, the 19-year-old stands out for his ability to stride forward in possession and fire incisive balls into midfield, averaging over 22 line-breaking passes per game. His completion rate for such passes is 94 per cent, the best in the tournament.

Whichever way you look at it, the numbers stack up.

Spain have averaged 28 sequences of nine-plus passes per 90 minutes — no nation at this World Cup have a higher rate — but the value that these sequences can offer is multi-pronged.

On the one hand, circulating the ball can slowly run down the opponents’ batteries as they are starved of possession for long periods, pinned further back towards their own goal with legs becoming heavier and minds cloudier. On the other, that dominance on the ball is intrinsically linked to Spain’s sharpness defensively on the rare occasions they do lose it. De la Fuente’s side are exceptional at counter-pressing — collapsing on to the ball to quickly regain possession and sustain their attack to suffocate the other team.

Per FIFA’s data, 12.2 per cent of Spain’s time out of possession at this tournament has been spent in a counter-pressing phase, which is the highest share of any side to reach the quarter-finals. As well as his tempo-dictating actions on the ball, Rodri also tops the list for counter-pressing wins among all players in this World Cup.

An example of the 30-year-old’s tenacity is shown below, during the 3-0 round of 32 win against Austria. When Lamine Yamal relinquishes possession in the Austria penalty area, Rodri is on hand to pounce on Marcel Sabitzer — quickly shaking him off the ball before looking up to find four red-shirted team-mates offering themselves as passing options.

There is a versatility to Spain that can embrace the transition and accelerate the game — using the moments of brief chaos to their advantage when the opposition are unsettled.

This is underpinned below, when looking at their volume of possessions (i.e. how often the ball changes hands) and their attacking efficiency, in which 31 per cent of Spanish moves enter the other team’s penalty area.

Combine the two, and Spain have shown there are multiple threats to their game that transcend long sequences of possession.

Yamal is the jewel in Spain’s crown, but the teenager has been less of a goal threat than he would have liked at this World Cup after working his way back to fitness following a hamstring injury towards the end of last season.

Though Yamal’s dribbling ability and deftness of touch can swing a game in an instant, the real star of Spain’s summer is the cohesion of their wider team — something that is a product of years of hard work: of their starting XI for the semi-final with France, seven had also begun the 2-1 win over England in the European Championship final two years ago.

There is a stability to Spain that resembles a club team at times, with De la Fuente having worked with many of this squad across the past decade during his time in the country’s youth setup.

A key theme of Spain’s tournament has been the use of their full-backs.

Whether through underlapping runs, overlapping ones, creating chances or popping up with crucial goals, the impact of Marc Cucurella and Pedro Porro has been notable when the Spanish have gone forward.

Cucurella’s rotational positions in concert with Alex Baena on Spain’s left have been excellent, with the pair ensuring that they occupy different channels of the pitch at any one point, to stretch the opposition and create tensions in their back line — as shown here in the semi-final defeat of France.

As evidence of this theme across the whole tournament, the same rotations can be found in the second group game, against Saudi Arabia — punishing the opposition in wide areas with opposite movements to drag players out of position.

The pattern has been identical on the right flank, with Porro’s clinching goal against France being a perfect example of the dovetailing wide players working to full effect.

Yamal stays in the widest channel of the pitch, which pulls left-back Lucas Digne further across — providing Porro with the space to make the inside channel run after a delightful one-two with Dani Olmo.

As The Athletic’s Liam Tharme has analysed, “bonus backs” have been a theme of this tournament, as full-backs or wing-backs act as the spare man to support the attack and crash into the penalty area. With two goals across the seven games, Porro is a perfect example of that — often acting as a foil for Yamal and linking excellently with his team-mates across the pitch.

That one-two with Olmo was his sixth of this World Cup — only three players (Belgium duo Kevin De Bruyne and Leandro Trossard and France’s Ousmane Dembele; all with seven) have engaged in more.

The balance in Spain’s width on both flanks is likely to be a key theme of the final when considering the roles of Argentina’s full-backs at both ends of the pitch.

We can start with their vulnerability out of possession — five of the seven goals conceded by the world champions have come from poor defending in wide areas. As shown below, three have been scored under similar circumstances from Argentina’s left side, against Jordan, Egypt and England — crosses not being dealt with when guided to the edge of the six-yard box.

Two further goals involved opponents getting round the sides too easily, with Cape Verde’s Deroy Duarte and Dan Ndoye of Switzerland both able to score from a tight angle in the penalty area after bypassing Argentina’s respective full-backs with neat interplay.

Given Spain’s tendency to combine so effectively on the flanks, Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni and his staff should be on high alert when looking to nullify the threat from wide areas, particularly as it has been an Achilles’ heel for their team throughout this tournament.

Going forward, Argentina do not possess natural width across their attacking line, aside from right midfielder Giuliano Simeone, who has started two of their seven World Cup games.

That means that their full-backs — most commonly Nicolas Tagliafico (on the left) and Nahuel Molina (right) — are typically the ones to stretch the pitch. Pinning both full-backs towards their own goal can be a useful tactic to reduce that threat, but Scaloni’s side thrive off the combinations in central areas with the technical quality of Lionel Messi, Enzo Fernandez, Julian Alvarez and Alexis Mac Allister.

In the attacking half, Argentina’s 33 per cent share of touches in the central third of the pitch is the highest of any team in this tournament.

Their narrow approach is largely by design as they look to slice through the opposition where possible, with 40 through balls attempted being the most at this World Cup. Only South Africa had a lower share (39 per cent) than Argentina’s 42 per cent of final-third entries in the widest channels of the pitch.

A large part of this is down to Messi.

The 39-year-old continues to defy logic with his otherworldly performances, sauntering around in opposition territory before bursting into life and inflicting maximum damage. It might be that he spends 64 per cent of his total time walking, but no player on earth optimises their movement better than Argentina’s captain.

The numbers underline just how crucial he remains.

Among all players to reach the round of 16, nobody has created a higher share of their team’s chances than Messi’s 33 per cent. Only Erling Haaland of Norway has had a larger chunk of his side’s non-penalty shots than the Argentinian’s 29 per cent. Morocco’s Achraf Hakimi is the sole player with a greater share of his nation’s touches in the attacking third than Messi’s 19 per cent.

In case it was not apparent, all roads still lead to Argentina’s mercurial magician.

Tactically, Messi has the freedom to wander anywhere across the pitch to find space from which to punish you. Sometimes he drops deeper to be involved in the build-up; on other occasions, he will drift across towards the left side of the pitch and sit in a pocket there.

In the semi-final against England, he stationed himself firmly in the right half-space before popping up with two assists in the closing stages to complete Argentina’s comeback.

His 12 goal contributions (scored eight, four assists) are more than any other player in the tournament as he looks to lift the World Cup trophy for the second successive time.

It might sound trite, but there is little more the Spanish can do than hope and pray he has an off-day tomorrow. Messi is Argentina, and Argentina is Messi.

Argentina have needed him to drag them over the line on multiple occasions on the way to their third World Cup final out of four. Compared with Spain’s near-flawless record, the reigning champions have spent 14 per cent of their tournament trailing, which is double the rate of their triumphant campaign in Qatar (seven per cent).

Many teams have learnt that you can never write Argentina off, because they fight and scrap until the very last whistle. Twelve of their 19 goals in this World Cup have come after the 75th minute (including those scored in extra time), with nine of those 12 changing the state of the game (i.e. equalising or taking the lead).

That is why it is so difficult to predict the outcome of this final.

Sunday will have the first- and second-placed teams in FIFA’s current global rankings going head-to-head, and is the first World Cup final between the reigning European Championship and Copa America title holders.

The Athletic’s forecast model gives Spain the edge, with a 59 per cent chance of victory to Argentina’s 41 per cent.

Neither nation has made a habit of losing in recent years: Spain’s last competitive defeat came in March 2023 away to Scotland during qualification for a Euros they subsequently won, and Argentina haven’t been beaten in knockout-phase football since a 2019 Copa America semi-final against Brazil in Brazil. They have won three major tournaments on the bounce in the years since.

Something has to give tomorrow. May the best team win.