The World Champions

In Portugal, the prevailing habit is to dispute. Criticism of referees and officiating often points to personal reasons, becoming, through the pervasive and voracious nature of social media, unthinkable and unacceptable.

João Pinheiro arrives at the World Cup and earns a presence of undeniable prestige and quality. He officiates three matches (Switzerland-Bosnia and Herzegovina, Canada-South Africa, and Argentina-Switzerland) and serves as the fourth official for Danny Makkelie in the Morocco-Haiti game.

While petty squabbles and criticisms, doubts and questions multiply in the country, largely due to media irresponsibility – a small nation in so many aspects, and rarely focused on elevating and recognizing those who truly make a difference in high-stakes international competitions – João Pinheiro continues his journey with Luciano Maia and Bruno Jesus. He remains part of a task force of thirteen referees for the final matches of the competition, having received excellent evaluations in the three games where he served as the central referee.

Naturally, he misses out on appointments for the four final matches, where the geopolitics of officiating takes precedence, and balanced selections are crucial. Alongside him, also without further assignments, are Marciniak, Sampaio, Faghani…

João Pinheiro is still a young referee (38 years old), and with him comes the obvious possibility of being appointed for the 2030 World Cup in Spain, Morocco, and Portugal. Few can imagine the technical, physical, and psychological capacity required to reach the World Cup level.

The vast majority of his critics, in fact, don't even know how many Laws of the Game there are. Yet, they claim the right to hurl insults, often anonymously, a cowardice enabled by the voracity of social media.

João Pinheiro is a World Champion, and he will undoubtedly leverage the extraordinary experience of the World Cup in the Americas to further enhance and elevate his fantastic international career.

He began by surprising the world with an immaculate qualification, emerging from an African group that included Cameroon, Libya, and Angola. The Blue Sharks' journey to the World Cup made the team from the southernmost archipelago of Macaronesia the sensation of the tournament.

Island reality, ultra-periphery, additional difficulties in assembling a prestigious squad – these were merely minor obstacles for Bubista, the coach who knows everything about his country's football and always believed the miracle of qualification was possible.

Imagine what followed in the Americas: standing toe-to-toe with three World Champions (Spain, Uruguay, and Argentina) is not within everyone's reach. In fact, it's accessible to very few. Yet, Cape Verde captured global attention with their determination, grit, and ability to approach every moment of the game as if it were absolutely decisive. And they were. They propelled the team from the Atlantic archipelago to the highest level of world football, guiding fans into a mindset of belief and pride that was unthinkable just months before their World Cup adventure.

Bubista, with a handful of heroic Cape Verdeans, is a World Champion. He showed everyone, his own people and the rest of the world, that when efforts are united towards a common goal, there's no waiting time, no goal that makes us doubt…

A year ago, when he became a Club World Cup champion with Chelsea, he had already left his unmistakable mark. A left-back who pushes forward like a winger, whose grit and confidence are his trademark, and whose dense hair serves as a clear warning to opponents.

Marc Cucurella was the subject of one of the most talked-about transfers of the last window, moving from the Blues of Stamford Bridge to Real Madrid. But before establishing himself on Paseo de la Castellana, he once again proved why he kept Alex Grimaldo on the bench in the last European Championship: Cucurella is, for everyone, one of the best full-backs in the world, and for many, the absolute best.

His endless tenacity, enviable physical capacity, and sheer will to play are the calling cards of the new merengue player who is an indispensable figure for his national team. Even before the final, Marc is already a World Champion, and he aims to add the ultimate glory with his national team to his club shield.

Words are beginning to fail when describing this lad from Rosario, a city of football and great rivalries between Newell's Old Boys and Rosario Central. At 39, Messi's perception of the game is only measurable in exact proportion to his humility.

Without the ball, his influence on the Argentine national team is even greater than when it's at his feet.

Because he seeks the ideal position, understands opponent movements, finds passing lanes, and allows for quick decisions by teammates when the team regains possession.

Lionel's greatest danger, precisely, is when his team doesn't have possession. Opponents recognize this and know that his magic, technical quality, vision, and unpredictability do the rest.

Goalscorer, assist-provider, or simply a team player, Lionel Messi embodies pure football. He plays for the team, and the team plays with him. He doesn't wait for anything to fall from the sky, never points to himself, but rather integrates into the collective, understanding exactly that this is the entire essence of the game.

Argentina plays with soul, with a unique condition that translates into presence of mind and the quality of each player transmitted to the whole. This is where the man who, on the verge of 40, doesn't need to return to prove absolutely anything comes in. Because he has never failed to be where he was needed to elevate his teammates to levels of excellence.

While in other cases the joke writes itself, with Messi, the confidence of an extraterrestrial is enough: in the quality of his passing, the brilliance of his dribbling, the excellence of his collective sense, the capacity for decision-making, whenever necessary.

That's what places him alongside Edson Arantes do Nascimento and Diego Armando Maradona as one of the three Olympians.

After all, Leo is also D10S.