The final is set: Spain vs Argentina — and England just gave a masterclass in how to throw a game away

The semi-finals are done, and we've got our final: Spain against Argentina, Sunday, at the MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. La Roja against La Albiceleste. The team that hasn't conceded a single goal all tournament against the team that refuses, no matter what, to die. It's going to be enormous.

But before we get to the final, I need to talk about what just happened in Atlanta. Because England — England — just handed me the clearest, most infuriating lesson in football cowardice I've seen in years. And I can't let it go without saying my piece.

Let me take both games in turn.

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Spain 2-0 France: the machine rolls on

The first semi-final, on Tuesday in Dallas, was billed as the great clash of styles: France's devastating attack against Spain's impenetrable defence. Something had to give. And what gave, comprehensively, was France.

Spain won 2-0 and honestly it could have been more. Mikel Oyarzabal opened the scoring in the 22nd minute from the penalty spot, after that man Lamine Yamal — 18 years old, and the best player at this World Cup by a distance — was fouled by Digne in the box. Then Pedro Porro sealed it in the 58th with a lovely give-and-go with Dani Olmo, side-footing past Maignan. Spain even had a third disallowed for offside.

Here's the stat that tells the whole story: Spain's all-world defence restricted France — France! With Mbappé, Dembélé, Olise, Doué — to just 0.3 expected goals from ten shots. They suffocated the most feared attack in world football. And Spain STILL haven't conceded a single goal in the entire tournament. Not one, in six games. Unai Simón's net remains unbreached. That's not luck. That's the best defensive team performance of a generation.

France couldn't pass their first real test. Spain are in their first World Cup final since 2010 — the year they won it. And on this evidence, you'd be brave to bet against them doing it again.

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Argentina 2-1 England: and now let's talk about Thomas Tuchel

Right. Deep breath. Because this one made my blood boil, and I wasn't even supporting either team.

For an hour, England were the better side. Anthony Gordon put them ahead in the 55th minute, tapping home a Morgan Rogers cross in transition. Trent's boy Tino Spence was immense down the flank. They looked organized, dangerous, in control. They were 1-0 up against the defending champions with half an hour to play and a World Cup final in their sights.

And then Thomas Tuchel did the thing. THE thing. The thing that cowardly, frightened teams always do when they should know better.

He parked the bus.

With thirty minutes still to play — THIRTY — England stopped trying to play football. They dropped deeper, and deeper, and deeper, until the entire team was camped inside its own penalty area, inviting Argentina onto them, defending a one-goal lead as if it were the last stand at the Alamo. They stopped attacking. They stopped keeping the ball. They stopped doing all the things that had given them the lead in the first place. The plan, if you can call it that, was simple: hunker down, weather the storm, and cling on.

And here's the thing every single person who has ever watched football knows in their bones: when you invite pressure like that, when you refuse to leave your own box, when you give a team like Argentina — with Lionel Messi, of all people, pulling the strings — thirty minutes of uncontested possession around your area, you are not protecting a lead. You are signing its death warrant. You're not defending. You're just delaying the inevitable and praying.

It doesn't work. It almost never works. And it didn't work tonight.

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The punishment

Messi, given all the time and space in the world because England had retreated into a shell, started conducting. And in the 85th minute, he floated a cross into the box and Enzo Fernández rose to head home the equalizer. 1-1. The MetLife — sorry, the Atlanta crowd — erupted, and you could feel it, that horrible inevitability, the sense that England had brought this entirely on themselves.

Then, in the 92nd minute, deep into stoppage time, Alexis Mac Allister hit the post, Messi collected the rebound, and floated ANOTHER perfect cross into the box. Lautaro Martínez climbed above a static, exhausted, retreating England defence and headed it into the net. 2-1 Argentina. Both goals assisted by Messi. Both goals scored because England spent thirty minutes doing nothing but defending and eventually, inevitably, cracked.

And that was that. Argentina into the final. England out. And Thomas Tuchel walking off having authored one of the great acts of self-sabotage in recent tournament history.

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Why this makes me so angry

I know some people will defend Tuchel. They'll say Argentina are the champions, that seeing out a 1-0 is a legitimate strategy, that England were unlucky to concede so late. I don't buy a word of it.

Here's the truth: parking the bus is a coward's gambit dressed up as pragmatism. When you have a lead and you have thirty minutes left, the best way — the ONLY reliable way — to protect that lead is to keep the ball, keep attacking, keep the opposition pinned back in THEIR half where they can't hurt you. Possession is the best defence. A second goal is the best insurance. Every good manager knows this.

What Tuchel did instead was surrender the initiative entirely. He told his players, in effect, "we're not good enough to see this out by playing football, so we're going to hide." And when you tell a team like Argentina — a team with the greatest player who ever lived, a team that has scored late in game after game this tournament — that they can have the ball and camp on your box for half an hour, you are asking, begging, to be punished. Argentina had scored something like nine goals in the final stages of games at this tournament coming into tonight. NINE. Everybody knew they were lethal late. And England invited exactly that scenario.

The maddening part is that England were the better team. They didn't need to do this. They had Argentina rattled. And instead of pressing home their advantage, they got scared of their own lead and handed the initiative — and ultimately the game — to the one team on earth you most want to keep quiet.

It's the oldest lesson in football and somehow, at a World Cup semi-final, with a place in the final on the line, one of the most well-paid managers in the game forgot it. You cannot defend a lead by only defending. You just can't. Tonight was the proof, written in the cruellest possible ink.

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The final: Spain vs Argentina

So here we are. Sunday. New Jersey. Spain vs Argentina.

Spain: the best team in the tournament, arguably. Yet to concede a goal. Yamal playing like a generational talent, the midfield purring, the defence utterly watertight. They're the favourites and they've earned that tag.

Argentina: the champions, the survivors, the team that has now come from behind or gone to extra time in match after match and STILL keeps winning. They have Messi, in his final World Cup, two games — no, one game now — from the most storybook ending imaginable: back-to-back World Cups, the perfect farewell. They should have gone out against Cape Verde. They should have gone out against Egypt when they were 2-0 down. They found a way every time. You cannot, ever, write them off.

Immovable object meets unkillable force. Spain's defence against Messi's destiny. I genuinely can't call it.

What I can tell you is this: if either team gets a lead on Sunday and decides to park the bus with half an hour to go, they'll deserve exactly what they get. England just showed us all how that story ends.

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One last thought

As a Portugal fan, this final is bittersweet. Spain knocked us out. Watching them lift the trophy would sting. And watching Messi complete his fairytale while Ronaldo watches from home is its own particular kind of ache.

But football doesn't care about my feelings, and the two best, most deserving teams are in the final. Spain earned it with the tournament's best defence. Argentina earned it with the tournament's biggest heart. It's going to be a hell of a game.

Sunday. New Jersey. One of these two lifts the World Cup. I'll be watching, a neutral at last, and for the first time in a while, just enjoying the football.

Bring it on.