Tonight, Lionel Messi will walk out for his third World Cup final at 39 years old. Should Argentina beat Spain, they will be the first side to retain the trophy since Brazil in 1962, and the case for Messi as the greatest player of all time will be closed for good. As a self-respecting Englishman, I will not be cheering for Argentina after Wednesday’s depressing semi-final. I’ll be silently supporting Messi for a very different reason. At 5ft 7in, he represents a victory for the least pitied disadvantaged group: the vertically challenged man.
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Matthew Fraser
My Paris neighbourhood has become a no-go zone
Back in 2022, TikTok was awash with videos hailing ‘short king spring’: a trend celebrating the rise (no pun intended) of famous men under 5ft 8in. Fast-forward four years and we seem to be enjoying a ‘short king summer’ of which Messi is just one face – or, rather, body. Arthur Fery (5ft 9in), became the shortest male tennis player to reach the Wimbledon semi-final in decades. The Odyssey actor Tom Holland (5ft 8in) revealed he had secretly married one of the world’s most beautiful women, Zendaya (5ft 10in). And Ben Duckett (5ft 7in) was our highest run scorer in an otherwise miserable Test series against New Zealand.
