There’s a strange, perhaps poetic, echo of the past — a kind of glorious deja vu — in the things Lionel Messi does for the Argentine football team.He barely runs anymore, yet he’s always where one least expects. Above, the 39-year-old in action against Austria, during the ongoing World Cup. (Getty Images)This is a team sport and, usually, no matter how great the individual player, a single person does not dictate the fortunes of a team.1998 was France’s year and the spotlight was on Zinedine Zidane, but the midfield genius had around him some of the most outstanding players in the history of the game: Thierry Henry, Patrick Vieira, Lilian Thuram, to name just a few.The same goes for Brazil in 1970. Pele may have been the focal point, but this was a team that also featured Jairzinho, Rivellino, Gerson Rodrigues, Tostao…There’s only one great footballing nation where an individual has eclipsed a whole team at the World Cup. 1986 will always be the year of Maradona, and the only example of a one-man show that led to a World Cup triumph.Then, in 2022, Lionel Messi inspired Argentina to its second World Cup title, and he did it with an aura and oversized influence that almost matched Maradona’s in ’86. Messi scored in every phase of the tournament — group, round of 16, quarter-final, semi-final and final (a brace), becoming the only player in football history to do so, and the only player to win the Golden Ball twice (he first won it in 2014).What’s utterly, incredibly remarkable is that he looks set to do it all again, and he just turned 39 on Wednesday.His current coach was his teammate when Messi made his World Cup debut in 2006. He has no business playing the way he is playing at this Cup.His moves have the vibe of street football, where there is always that one boy who is unbeatable, who will score all the goals and run circles around everyone else. But this is professional football. At its highest level.It’s like Messi sees things no one else can see, mapping the field in a way that’s impossible to quantify in real time, or defend against.Argentina has played just two games so far, but he has already scored five goals, just two short of his total in the 2022 World Cup.No one else from the team is on the scoresheet. Messi barely runs anymore, and yet he always seems to be in a pocket of space. He is where one least expects. He is in the blind spot of the entire opposition team. Four men can be tasked with marking him, as a supremely fit Austrian squad did in the second game, and yet he melts from view.In the first match, against Algeria, Messi ambled into no-man’s land between two lines of the Algerian defence, received a defence-splitting pass, turned in a flash, took three steps and unleashed a fierce, perfect shot no goalkeeper could have saved. For each of the next two goals, the Argentine team pulled the Algerian defence one way, allowing Messi to slip into scoring positions totally unmarked.It’s like a Hollywood heist movie, an elaborate scheme of red herrings that all end the same way: with Messi scoring.For his first goal against Austria, Messi, marked by three men near the right touchline, just inside the opposition half, played a simple pass to move the ball to the middle to Lautaro Martinez. Martinez was unmarked since most of the Austrian defence was concentrating on Messi, and ran quickly towards the box, releasing the ball to the wing just as the defenders were catching up with him.Meanwhile, Messi had ambled innocuously towards the box, forgotten by the defenders as they chased the Argentines who actually had the ball.As the cutback came in from the wing, only Martinez knew Messi would be in the right place. He calmly let the ball pass through his legs, even though he was in a striking position inside the box, to let an unmarked Messi pretty much walk up to it and unleash a rocket shot into the bottom corner.If Maradona was El Barrilete Cosmico or The Cosmic Kite, Messi is The Ghost Who Walks.(Email Rudraneil Sengupta on rudraneil@ gmail.com. The views expressed are personal)