Messi smashes more records – even his human moments are part of his extra-terrestrial legend

‘He might have missed it on purpose.’

We have reached a point now with Lionel Messi, who became the leading goalscorer in World Cup history after the first of his two goals against Austria, where even his most He Is Human After All moments are part of his alien boy persona.

Danny Murphy did at least quickly explain he was joking about Messi’s missed penalty, but it’s rarely the best thing for any joke to have to immediately make clear you were joking.

It was also a very cack missed penalty, setting another record for Messi. Sure, it probably won’t be the record people talk about after this game but his third missed penalty takes him top of that less auspicious table.

You’re still thinking about the good news, aren’t you?

You don’t have to be a hopeless football romantic to accept and understand that sweeping home from the edge of the box to round off a slick Argentina move was a far better way for the all-time World Cup goals record to fall than a mere penalty.

We consider ourselves firmly in the ‘penalties are goals, though’ camp but… yeah. That was a lovely goal, Messi’s precise finish after Thiago Almada produced a textbook case study for the ‘dummies are assists’ camp eliciting a “and there it is” on commentary that is more usually associated with a batter reaching a century.

It’s apt. Because Messi spent those first 37 minutes like a batter on 99. There was that tingle from the crowd, the anticipation that The Moment was about to arrive. We’ll not dwell on the leg-stump half-volley he missed early on because we’re boring even ourselves with the analogy now.

The rest of the game was a curious spectacle. Messi and his achievements are so utterly at the centre of this Argentina side’s universe that almost nothing else cuts through. The result felt like a formality – almost an irrelevance – by that early point, the Messicentric nature of the game aided and abetted by Austria being the very definition of neat and tidy but carrying no threat.

Even when Ralf Rangnick finally relented, accepted that pretty triangles at the back weren’t going to cut it and through no Marko Arnautovic to go Full Premier League about it, Austria remained determinedly, prettily ineffective. And Stefan Posch absolutely does not wear a mask with anything like the panache of Djed Spence.

A tough night all round for Austria, then, with the only time the stadium reached anything like the noise that greeted Messi’s every touch reserved for the admittedly several times Shakira was on the big screen.

The thing for Argentina, though, is that this all works. The rest of this team, full of elite talent from a collection of the world’s biggest clubs and Tottenham, operates in service of Messi. It’s a well-worn point by now, but the contrast with Portugal and Ronaldo is just so stark.

Almada’s dummy is an obvious but unimprovable example. He has a look, sees That Man Again appearing in a better position and nonchalantly allows the ball to reach him. We’re not saying Almada wouldn’t have done that for another player, or that a Portugal player wouldn’t do that for Ronaldo, but we’re not not saying it either.

Such is Messi’s gravitational pull now that even when he tries to create a goal for someone else he ends up scoring it himself. He played Bukayo Saka to Julian Alvarez’s Marcus Rashford deep into stoppage time but when the Atletico Madrid man’s shot was saved it broke to Who Else But Him to sweep home at the second attempt and extend his lead over Miroslav Klose, Kylian Mbappe and the rest.

The five goals he has just two games into this bulkiest of all World Cups would already have been enough to win the Golden Boot at four previous tournaments.

Argentina securing their place in the last 32 and looking entirely capable of defending their title shouldn’t be a footnote, but for now that’s where we are. We are witnessing history.