France vs Argentina

Lore & Background

Argentina had previously won the World Cup in 1978 and 1986. They had finished as runners-up in 1930, 1990 and 2014. After the 2014 final loss, they lost two consecutive Copa América finals to Chile, in 2015 and 2016. After being eliminated from the 2018 World Cup in the first knockout round, and finishing third in the 2019 Copa América, Argentina's newly appointed coach Lionel Scaloni led them to their first international title since 1993 when they defeated defending champions Brazil 1–0 in the 2021 Copa América final, handing captain Lionel Messi his first senior international title.

After defeating Italy in the 2022 Finalissima, Argentina were considered one of the favourites to win the 2022 World Cup. France were the defending champions from the 2018 World Cup, which made this the first time since the 2002 final that a team had made consecutive appearances in the final, and the first time since 1998 that the title holders qualified for the subsequent final—both feats were achieved by Brazil. France had also previously won the World Cup in 1998.

France also reached the 2006 final, but lost to Italy in a penalty shoot-out. As defending champions, France also entered the 2022 World Cup as one of the favourites to win. They aimed to become the third country to successfully defend a World Cup title, after Italy in 1938 and Brazil in 1962. France manager Didier Deschamps was seeking to become the second manager to win two men's FIFA World Cup titles, after Vittorio Pozzo with Italy in 1934 and 1938.

Having won the 1998 tournament as a player, Deschamps was also seeking to become the third person to win three World Cup titles, after Pelé (all three as a player) and Mário Zagallo (two as a player, one as a manager). The two nations met in the knockout stage for the second straight World Cup. In 2018 in Russia at the Kazan Arena in the round of 16, France won the encounter 4–3 in what The Independent called 'one of the greatest World Cup games of all time'.

Antoine Griezmann opened the scoring with a penalty before Ángel Di María and Gabriel Mercado put Argentina in front, with France then scoring the next three goals courtesy of Benjamin Pavard's volley outside of the box – which was later voted as the goal of the tournament – and then Kylian Mbappé twice.

Reader's Guide

The final took place in front of 88,966 spectators and was refereed by Szymon Marciniak. Argentina took a 1–0 lead after Lionel Messi scored from a penalty kick in the 23rd minute. Ángel Di María made it 2–0 in the 36th minute with a low shot into the corner of the goal after a sweeping Argentina counterattack. France failed to make a shot on goal for the vast majority of the match, until Kylian Mbappé scored two goals within 97 seconds (the first of which was from a penalty kick), making the score 2–2 in the 81st minute.

During extra time, Messi scored again to give Argentina a 3–2 lead. Mbappé scored a second penalty to tie the game 3–3 with just a few minutes remaining, becoming the second male player to score a hat-trick in a World Cup final after Geoff Hurst in 1966. Argentina won the ensuing penalty shoot-out 4–2 to win their third World Cup, and their first since 1986. It was the second time that Argentina reached the World Cup final after losing their opening match, the other occasion being in 1990.

It was the second time that a team won the tournament after losing their opening match, following Spain in 2010. France became the first team in history to score three goals in a World Cup final and lose. Messi was named the man of the match and won the Golden Ball as FIFA's best player of the tournament. He became the first player to win a second World Cup Golden Ball, having previously won it in 2014.

The 2022 final was ranked by the football media and fans alike as one of the greatest World Cup finals, and one of the greatest matches in the history of the sport.

Did You Know?

• The match ball for the final was the Adidas Al-Hilm, meaning 'The Dream' in Arabic.
• Lusail Stadium, the venue, was designed by British firm Foster and Partners and Populous, supported by MANICA Architecture.