GIANNOTHER PLANET

Messi and Mbappe have saved smug Infantino from World Cup disaster

- JEREMY CROSS

GIANNI INFANTINO will be feeling - and looking, no doubt like the smuggest man in the Lusail Stadium.

That is where the World Cup final will take place today between Argentina and France - and it's the one Infantino will have wanted.

A shootout between Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappe for the biggest prize in sport, in one of the great arenas, more than justifies FIFA's arguably scandalous decision to award this World Cup to Qatar in the first place.

In brilliant fashion, Messi and the heir to his footballing throne have become the innocent victims of a sports-washing programme of epic proportions.

In the space of one mesmerising but misleading month, we have somehow been transported through a time which began with people bracing themselves for the tournament nobody wanted to relishing the final everyone craved.

In footballing terms, it will be a cracker too.