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ATLANTA — When Lionel Messi steps onto the pitch at the 2026 World Cup final, it could very well mark the 39-year-old's last appearance in an Argentine shirt. Yet the match won't simply be a tribute to the legendary career of soccer's greatest international player. It will also be a celebration of the sport's bright and exciting future.
Argentina will take on Spain on July 19 at MetLife Stadium, meaning Messi will face his natural successor to the throne — 19-year-old Spanish sensation Lamine Yamal — on the pitch for the very first time. For supporters across the globe, the sport's most prestigious showpiece will serve as a coronation, a chance to say goodbye to King Messi while thrusting Prince Yamal into the brightest spotlight imaginable. From one G.O.A.T. to the next, it will represent the ultimate passing of the torch through the sport's grandest stage.
"It is poetic," Argentina fan Sirj tells Sports Illustrated. "It's full circle, the hand-off from the greatest of all time to potentially the greatest of all time."
"A storybook finish for Messi's career," Argentina fan Tokul adds.
While the final will mark the first time Messi and Yamal share a pitch, the two actually crossed paths many years ago when Yamal was just seven months old — a chance, or perhaps destined, encounter that many believe made Yamal's rise to prominence inevitable.
In 2007, a then-20-year-old Messi was selected by his club Barcelona to take part in a charity photoshoot at Camp Nou, posing for a calendar aimed at raising funds for UNICEF and the Barça Foundation's childhood protection initiatives. The six-month-old Catalan infant in the bathtub that Messi was photographed with turned out to be none other than Yamal himself.
In 2007, a 20-year-old Lionel Messi was pictured bathing a baby for a Barça-UNICEF charity campaign—that baby, Lamine Yamal, is now a rising football star. pic.twitter.com/wCbjWHCEm5
"UNICEF held a raffle in the Rocafonda neighborhood of Mataró, where Lamine's family lived," charity photoshoot photographer Joan Monfort recalled in 2025. "They entered the raffle for a chance to be photographed at Camp Nou with a Barça player. And they won."
"Messi didn't even know how to hold him at first. Messi is quite an introverted person, quite shy. He walked out of the locker room and suddenly found himself in another locker room with a plastic tub full of water and a baby inside. It was a complicated situation.
"For Lamine to grow up and become a footballer, and for this photo to exist, I'm just really glad it happened. It feels especially meaningful in today's football."
Many fans viewed that encounter as a symbolic "soccer baptism," foreshadowing the crown Messi would one day pass to Yamal. Nearly two decades later, it appears that moment has finally come.
Like Looking in a Mirror
Yamal has already stepped into Messi's shoes at Barcelona.
The Spanish club is where Messi developed from the age of 13 into an unrivaled global superstar. He spent 17 seasons at Camp Nou, frequently operating from the right wing — most notably during the celebrated "MSN" era, which featured an attacking trio of Messi, Neymar Jr., and Luis Suárez. The left-footed icon claimed 10 La Liga titles and four UEFA Champions League trophies during that period, cementing his status as one of the greatest players in history. The first seven of Messi's eight Ballon d'Or victories came during his time in Catalonia.
The iconic No. 10 departed Barça for Paris Saint-Germain in 2021, and less than two years later, the club's new standard-bearer emerged. Also a left-footed right winger, Yamal — who joined Barça's youth academy at age 7 — made his first-team debut in April 2023 at just 15 years old in a 4–0 victory over Real Betis, becoming the youngest player ever to feature for the club.
He skyrocketed from there, breaking records at every turn. He officially inherited the club's No. 10 jersey last summer, shortly after his 18th birthday. Wearing that iconic number, he netted 16 league goals last season — more than any of his teammates — while also leading the division with 11 assists, helping Barcelona claim their second straight La Liga title.
Both Messi and Yamal share an exceptional ability to read the game and an almost magnetic connection with the ball, using sharp, elusive movements to carve through defenses in the final third.
"There is so much magic to the way both of them handle the ball, dribble, just the way they move," Argentina fan Zoltan says. "Watching Messi with the skill that he has on the ball and the way that he moves is so beautiful to watch, and I see that in Yamal. Even if this is Messi's last tournament, the future is amazing for football in the world."
Adds Sirj: "Yamal has this calmness about him that Messi has. He reminds me a lot of Messi in that regard. The cool calmness, the hunger, the drive, the assertiveness that both of them have is unparalleled."
Lamine Yamal to Stand Alone
While Yamal has been candid about his lifelong admiration for Messi, the teenager is equally determined to forge his own distinct legacy.
"My goal isn't to be compared to [the likes of Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Neymar]; it's to be mentioned alongside them," Yamal said ahead of the tournament. "So ... my name will be in that group."
The 2025 Ballon d'Or runner-up is still working his way back from a hamstring injury sustained in April and has yet to hit his peak form this summer. Even so, he is well on his way to establishing his own identity in the sport.
Despite finding the net just once so far in his World Cup debut, he has been a key factor in Spain's run to the final. He has been a constant menace down the flank, regularly forcing opposing defenses to overload his side. Most recently, it was his work on the ball that won the penalty kick that broke the deadlock against France in Tuesday's semifinal, a match Spain went on to win 2–0. Messi may boast a remarkable eight goals and four assists this summer, but unlike Yamal, he didn't reach a World Cup final until he was 27, at the 2014 tournament in Brazil.
Messi himself has full confidence in Yamal. "There is a new generation of footballers who are very good and who have many years ahead of them, but if I have to choose one because of age, for what he has done so far and for the future he may have, it is Lamine," Messi said in May. "There's no doubt, for me, he's the best."
As the soccer legend takes what is likely his final bow on the international stage on Sunday, Yamal will at last have his opportunity to stand alone — as the new King of Soccer.