Messi Scores in a Seventh Straight World Cup Game; Last 32 Is Set
Argentina rested nine players and still beat Jordan 3-1, with a substitute named Messi rewriting the record book again.
Lionel Scaloni rested nine of his starters, left Lionel Messi on the bench, and watched Argentina win anyway. Then, with Jordan refusing to fold, he sent Messi on. The 39-year-old bent in a low free-kick to seal a 3-1 victory and add one more line to a record book he already owns.
The goal made Messi the first player to score in seven consecutive World Cup matches, a streak running across tournaments, according to Opta. It was his sixth goal of this World Cup and the 19th of his career, stretching the all-time mark he set earlier in the group stage when he passed every previous scorer against Austria.
Argentina, the holders, had already wrapped up top spot in Group J before kickoff, which is why Scaloni felt free to rotate. Sky Sports reported that Giovani Lo Celso curled in a free-kick in the 19th minute and Lautaro Martinez converted a penalty before Jordan's Al-Tamari pulled one back. Messi's arrival settled it.
The result was one of the last to complete the group stage, and with it the knockout bracket fell into place. Thirty-two teams advanced and 16 went home, among them Iran, Scotland, South Korea, Uruguay and Saudi Arabia. The round of 32 opens with a heavy slate of last-32 ties:
- Sunday, June 28: South Africa vs Canada, in Inglewood
- Monday, June 29: Brazil vs Japan, in Houston
- Wednesday, July 1: England vs Congo DR in Atlanta; United States vs Bosnia-Herzegovina in Santa Clara
- Friday, July 3: Argentina vs Cape Verde, in Miami Gardens
Co-hosts Mexico go into the knockouts as one of the form teams after a 3-0 win over Czechia, and the United States came through its group as well, keeping all three host nations alive into July. The bracket's feel-good story, though, is Cape Verde: the Atlantic island nation of about half a million people reached the last 32 of a World Cup for the first time, and lands Argentina for its trouble.
That Scaloni could make nine changes and still win comfortably says plenty about where Argentina sit. The holders have not needed to over-extend Messi, whose six goals have come in measured spells, and the rotation looks deliberate with three weeks of knockout football ahead.
Argentina's afternoon carried a quieter message under the milestones. A side that beat Jordan with its captain watching most of it looks built to go deep whether or not Messi plays every minute, an insurance policy the kind of squad depth the United States could not count on a few tournaments ago.
They meet Cape Verde next, themselves a first-time knockout story, in Miami Gardens on July 3. Messi turned 39 the week the tournament reached its knockout rounds. On this evidence, he is in no hurry to stop.
