[Saba Sports News] The final of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, co-hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico, is set to take place in New York City, featuring Spain against defending champions Argentina. Ahead of the match, the biggest talking point is an old photograph taken 19 years ago. Back in 2007, Lionel Messi, the Argentine football legend who was just 20 years old at the time, shot a charity calendar alongside Lamine Yamal, the Spanish international who was only a few months old then. The snapshot captured Messi bathing the infant Yamal. Now, the two players are poised to face off against each other in the World Cup final. Messi addressed the viral picture publicly for the first time at a FIFA event in New York recently. “That photo is absolutely incredible. I took that picture with him when he was just a baby… and now we are both competing on the World Cup stage. It’s insane,” he said. The charity campaign in 2007 was jointly arranged by local Spanish media and UNICEF. Yamal’s family won a chance to take calendar photos with Messi — who was playing for FC Barcelona back then — inside the locker rooms at Camp Nou. Speaking highly of the football prodigy born in 2007, Messi spared no praise: “He is an extraordinary player… a global superstar. He is only 19 and has an incredibly bright future ahead of him. I wish him all the best.” Yet he shifted tone and issued a firm statement: “We will do everything we can to make sure he does not lift the trophy this time around.”
The editor believes that as the World Cup final draws near, this photo has gone viral across the globe. A final featuring Messi versus Yamal is more dramatic than any movie script.