World Cup final Argentina vs France, Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe, location and kick off time, how to watch, weather forecast, head to head record, road to the final, predicted starting xi, squad, betting odds

Although neither will line up directly opposite each other on the pitch and will likely only encounter each other before and/or after the game, both men’s ability to impact the game will go a long way to deciding which of their respective team’s wins the contest.

Kylian Mbappe is just 23 years old but he already pockets the highest salary in the football world – reportedly a whopping €630 million ($1bn AUD) over three seasons.

He is also the face of France’s world champion team, the razor-sharp cutting edge of an attack that has scythed through opponents this World Cup.

That team is already in rarefied air as one of a select few to reach the final of the tournament as defending champions. On Monday morning (2am AEDT), they face Lionel Messi’s Argentina in a bid to become just the third team in Cup history to go back-to-back, and the first since Brazil in 1962.

Four years ago, the teams met in the Round of 16 in Russia. On that day, Mbappe announced himself on the world stage by instigating a remarkable 4-3 comeback in one of the most memorable and thrilling games of the tournament.

Mbappe earned a penalty with a stunning 75-yard run early in the match, before scoring two goals in quick succession in the second half to send the Albiceleste packing. In a match of two masterful No 10s – Messi and Mbappe – it was the youngster who dominated proceedings and presented himself as a truly world-class player, and potentially the future best player in the world.

Little did the two superstars know that they would become club teammates before Qatar. It has been a rocky road to superstardom for Mbappe, rocked by ugly drama for club and country.

But on Monday morning, should he repeat the feats of 2018 and lead France to victory, he can put those dramas behind him – and perhaps proclaim himself the best player in the world.

In the final, Mbappe will face his PSG teammate in Lionel Messi. The golden boot race is level, with both players on five goals. Both are in with a strong chance of winning the golden ball as well as player of the tournament.

Should Mbappe get the upper hand, he will – at just 23 – have lifted the World Cup trophy twice and enshrined himself in football history.

In doing so, he might just prove himself the best player in the world.

As teammate Aurelien Tchouameni told TyC Sports: “For me, Kylian is the best … and he will prove it on Sunday.”

Standing in Mbappe’s way is Argentine legend Lionel Messi who has played like a man possessed as he looks to avenge his nation’s heartbreaking 2018 deafeat.

Five Budweiser Player of the Match awards says it all about Messi’s greatness in Qatar.

Despite having walked for 30km across all of Argentina’s games, the 35-year-old superstar has proven to be deadly when it matters most with five goals and three assists to his name which should came as no surprise given he’s created the most chances of anyone in Qatar with 14.

His most recent assist was perhaps his most special when he turned Gvardiol into a pretzel en route to putting it on a platter for Julian Alvarez to score.

Lionel Messi, though, sounds like a man content to ride off into the sunset, win or lose.

In an interview with Guillem Balague of CBS Sports and BBC Radio, Messi acknowledged that Sunday’s 2022 World Cup final, in which Argentina will play France, will “almost certainly” be his last match at a World Cup, and expressed an appreciation for everything that’s brought him to this stage.

“I’m enjoying it and for some time, I have been enjoying it in a different way than in the past,” Messi said in Spanish.

“Not only with the national side, but in life, too.”

This will be the second World Cup final for Messi, as Argentina lost to Germany on Mario Götze’s extra-time winner in 2014.

It would be Argentina’s first World Cup title since 1986, when Diego Maradona led them past West Germany in Mexico City.

For Messi, it is a chance to cement his legacy on the international stage, where he won his first major trophy only last summer in the Copa America, when Argentina beat Brazil in the final.

His relative lack of success with the Albicelestes compared to the club level with Barcelona has always been a knock on his legacy, particularly back home in Argentina.

In his last World Cup, though, Messi has been excellent, with a penalty kick goal and a dazzling assist in the semifinal against Croatia being arguably his best performance in a tournament where he has been the standout player. Argentina will go into the final with confidence.

“The truth is that it is a very powerful group, very strong,” Messi said.

“We said it when we lost our first game [to Saudi Arabia] which none of us expected, that we had trust in ourselves because we know what we have in this group, the strength that it has and in the end, that helped us grow, made us stronger and we knew that we could achieve this.

“A lot of happiness, obviously, to be able to achieve this, to be able to finish my career in the World Cup playing my last game in a final and the truth is that everything I experienced in this World Cup is something very exciting, what the people here have experienced and how the people back in Argentina are enjoying it.”

Win or lose, Messi stressed the achievements of the Argentine national team, which went 36 matches in a row unbeaten before the stunning loss to Saudi Arabia, and won a major trophy for the first time since the 1993 Copa America last summer.

“Obviously we all want to raise it, we want to be World Champions, but it’s a football match, anything can happen,” Messi said.

“And yes, hopefully this time it will be different from Brazil [2014].”

If Messi can finally capture the World Cup trophy that has so long eluded him he may finally put to bed the long running GOAT debate with Portugal superstar and arch rival Cristiano Ronaldo.