NEW JERSEY — Spain are champions of the world. In a final that will be replayed for decades, La Roja beat Argentina 2-1 at MetLife Stadium on Sunday night, an 88th-minute winner finishing the tournament the way the whole month had run: through the boots of a 19-year-old who plays like the sport was redesigned for him.
The match had everything its billing promised. The defending champions struck first against the run of play — their captain, in the last World Cup match of the most decorated career the sport has known, threading the opener through a crowd with the economy of a man who has scored every kind of goal there is. Spain's reply was their identity in miniature: fifteen passes, both full-backs inside the box, and the equaliser swept home at the far post before halftime.
The winner belonged to the tournament's face. Cutting in from the right in the 88th, the teenager feinted twice, opened his body for the far corner every goalkeeper on earth has now studied — and rolled it near post instead. The stadium's Spanish half needed a full second to believe it.
The records tumble together: Spain's second title completes the Euro-World Cup double; the winner becomes the youngest scorer in a final since Pelé, 1958; Argentina become the first holders since Brazil in 1998 to reach the next final and lose it; and the pass map of the winning goal — 23 touches, every outfield player involved — is already framed in Barcelona.
Argentina depart with the crown passed on and little to regret: champions for one full cycle, a 39-year-old captain who leaves the stage with Qatar's gold and New Jersey's silver, and a squad that made the machine sweat for every metre. The reign ends. The argument about the greatest ever does not.
For the 180 million Indians who watched past midnight, the morning's question writes itself — and our analysis of how Spain built this answers where blueprints come from. The celebration, though, needs no analysis. Some nights football simply wins. Full tournament wrap on our sports desk.
