A Day to Remember: World Cup Final and Open Championship

Welcome to the inaugural Box Score newsletter.

We are a group of friends who have spent our careers around sports at places like ESPN, Sports Illustrated and Golf Magazine and our personal lives even deeper in sports. We’ve been looking for a place that matched how we actually experience sports. Smart analysis (without the shouting). Real conversation (without the noise). In short, a good hang for sports fans. We’re so grateful that you’re here. Keep on the lookout for Box Score podcasts and live events this fall.

This week we were blessed with two incredible events, the World Cup final and the Open Championship. This sports convergence hasn’t happened since the United States hosted its first World Cup in 1994. So here are two Box Score Debriefs of all the action.

Neil Squires
Author and journalist, former chief sportswriter for the Express.

Neil McLeman
Broadcaster and journalist covering the Premier League, golf and tennis, former sportswriter for the Mirror.

Paul Mahoney
Award-wining journalist, former sportswriter for the Independent and Esquire.

Spain won the World Cup final over Argentina in extra time, 1-0. What made the difference for Spain in this game and in this tournament?

Paul Mahoney: Argentina is the first team in the history of World Cup finals not to have a single shot on goal in 90 minutes. Spain were great at just keeping the ball, which was Spain's DNA in this tournament and in previous tournaments. They are so good at playing that tiki-taka, Pep Guardiola style of football, and Argentina couldn't do anything. They were awful.

Neil Squires: Spain's defensive record in their whole tournament was extraordinary, but that was largely as a result of just keeping the ball. That's what they do better than anyone else. They managed to keep their cool as well just about in the final under severe provocation from an Argentina side that were desperate. Argentina give everything and you've got to admire that, but, boy, do they know how to bend a rule. The right team won for the tournament, I think.

Neil McLeman: I think it's a relief as a football lover that Spain did win that game today because over the course of this tournament Spain had been the best team. They were certainly the team that wanted to win today and Argentina didn't want to win. Spain are a real team in every sense of the word. Everyone was talking about who's going to win the Golden Boot, all these big superstars. We had Mbappe, Messi, Haaland, Bellingham and Kane at the top of the scoring charts. But Spain managed to win it without a superstar.

How surprised were you by Lionel Messi's World Cup run at age 39, and how does this performance affect how you look at his career and his accomplishments?

Neil Squires: It's amazing. The way Argentina play, he doesn't have to run. He just shows the amazing ability on the ball that he has and his vision. He's a remarkable player. Is he the best of all time? Jude Bellingham told him during the semi-final that Ronaldo was better than him. I'd side with Messi or Pele as the greatest of all time. Today, the only thing that soured it for me is that he didn't have his most influential game because of the way Argentina played. And I didn't like the way that he was trying to get Marc Cucurella sent off for talking with his hand over his mouth during the game. That's not the Messi we know. Argentina is supposed to be 10 devils, one angel, but he went over to the side of the devils there.

Paul Mahoney: Messi is obviously a freak. In the same way that Ronaldo is and all the modern guys. They are all so much more fit, and they have nutritionists and they're all in the gym. It's not like when Maradona or Pele was playing. But Messi is going to be 43 by the next World Cup. I think he's done, and it's rather sad that it's gone the way it has today. But he did win the World Cup the last time out. So that's something that Ronaldo has never done. But on the other hand, I think there's a big tarnish on Messi's career that he never tried it at his best in the Premier League, where at least Ronaldo did that.

Neil McLeman: What I find extraordinary about these old guys is still having the desire and drive to prove yourself and go out there and risk your legacy. Because you don't need the money, you don't need the titles. You've done everything in your career that anyone could do. Some people just win one major title in tennis and golf and that's it. They're made for life. They're happy. And these guys keep doing it again and again and again.

With three UK football writers, we have to ask: Is it ever coming home?

Neil Squires: My bubble was burst by that semi-final. This was England's moment. But it's always our moment, isn't it? And it never happens. My problem looking forward is that Harry Kane is going to be nearly 37 next time around. And you look around and there's nobody to replace him. So it's a raincloud of gloom over me, I'm afraid.

Neil McLeman: I'm definitely more optimistic. I think everyone's so negative about the performance because this was a real chance and England could have or should have beaten Argentina in that semi-final. But in the cold light of day, this is England's best ever performance in a World Cup abroad and the best ever since 1966. So they are making progress. I think they're going to be contenders certainly for Euro 28 and in the next World Cup as well.

Paul Mahoney: These big finals are all about moments, just like today. England left behind players who could create moments. They left behind Trent Alexander-Arnold, Phil Fodden and Cole Palmer. They had nobody to change a game other than Bellingham and Kane. And that Englishness of just playing safe is what trips them up all the time.

Speaking of moments, what particular moment will you remember most from this World Cup?

Neil Squires: Enzo Fernandez's tackle. I think that defined that final and opened the door for Spain to win it. Argentina got what they deserved in the end on the back of that tackle. Spain were the good guys and I am glad they won it.

Paul Mahoney: The England and Mexico teams walking out at the Azteca. It was just extraordinary. It was cinema and we don't get to see things like that very often. That's why the World Cup is so amazing because it brings those moments out.

Neil McLeman: Bellingham's two goals in virtually two minutes in Mexico to turn that game around. The whole drama of that game is what it's all about. ⚽️

Farrell Evans
Box Score co-founder, former Sports Illustrated golf writer and the executive producer of The Land We Share, a documentary about the intimate bonds between the Shinnecock Hills Golf Club and the Shinnecock Indian Nation.

John Garrity
Author of many golf books, including Ancestral Links: A Golf Obsession Spanning Several Generations, former Sports Illustrated writer.

Jim Gorant
Author of several books, including Fanatic: 10 Things All Sports Fans Should Do Before They Die, former Sports Illustrated senior editor.

Farrell Evans: In the end, Ryan Fox won the Open Championship at Royal Birkdale with a birdie on 18 for a final score of 10-under. But for a while, it looked like Cameron Young was going to win after posting a 64 two hours ahead of the leaders. How did you see it playing out as you were watching?

Jim Gorant: It's sort of anticlimactic when somebody wins from that far in advance. You like to see the action actually play out down the stretch so it worked out better that way. Ryan Fox made an incredible birdie at 18 on one of the hardest holes all week.

Farrell Evans: I wanted to see a playoff, but when you hit two perfect shots the way Fox did on 18, you have to give him credit. He really earned it.

Jim Gorant: I love how fast Fox plays. I hope he can start a new trend where guys don't stand around talking for a half-hour before every shot. Dude just steps up. The camera almost didn't have time to cut to him before he hit that final putt on 18.

John Garrity: It strikes me that when they play an Open Championship on these links courses where the conditions vary so dramatically from day to day and from hour to hour, it kind of undercuts the players who've got 100,000 notes written in their notebooks and in their course charts and sit there with the caddie doing all the mathematics. The game becomes more intuitive and more of a feel thing. And you don't get better at that just by sitting around talking about it for five minutes. So Fox’s pace actually could have been a benefit and the key to his success.

Farrell Evans: On Friday, Bryson DeChambeau was assessed a two-stroke penalty for unintentionally improving the area of his intended backswing. Was it a good call by the R&A? And do you think DeChambeau's threat to withdraw from the tournament was poor judgment?

John Garrity: I like the call. If the rough had been green and heavy with moisture, you could walk around back there and it wouldn't affect anything at all. But it really seemed to me that the area where the club would go back from the ball when he's swinging was materially affected by that and I think they were fully justified in penalizing him.

Jim Gorant: Whether he intended to or not, he's pressing down all the high fescue right behind his ball. So it seems like a clear penalty. As far as his reaction, you're allowed to make your case and you're allowed to be disappointed. But when you threaten to walk away, you're either incredibly thin-skinned or your ego is so huge that you think somehow you're threatening the Open Championship to back down from their position because they're going to lose you. Is that what his thought process was there? You're going to have to go on without me and that's going to somehow damage the championship?

Farrell Evans: Would he have responded the same way at the Masters? Players don't typically complain publicly about anything that happens at Augusta National.

John Garrity: I see Bryson behaving that way at Augusta because that's maybe his inherent nature. But I think Augusta National would lower the boom on him to the point of telling him that you don't play here next year.

Jim Gorant: The first thing I thought about when you brought that up is the Arnold Palmer embedded ball controversy on the 12th hole during the final round of the 1958 Masters. He was the game's top star at the time and he challenged the ruling. I mean, he played it and then he played the second ball right and then he challenged the ruling and it went his way in the end. They accommodated him and didn't kick him out or anything else, so I don't know.

John Garrity: I don't think Palmer's situation was as egregious as Bryson's or so in-your-face, and Bryson's protest was a lot less dignified, I think.

Farrell Evans: Many years ago, Larry Nelson commented that winning majors means everything when you're supposed to win them and they don't mean as much when you're not supposed to win them. Does having a winner like Ryan Fox, who wasn't expected to win, hurt the memory of this year's Open Championship? I like underdogs but I also would have liked to have seen Rory and Scottie battling it out down the stretch.

Jim Gorant: When you've got the big names battling it out down the stretch, that certainly adds some spice and some interest to it, no doubt. But there are other things too that work. With Fox, you get a sense that this guy's on the rise and he's going to be a player and this major win is something that really launches him to that next level. That's really exciting. If he's some one-off who had a week out of nowhere and then went back to nowhere, then I think we're having a different conversation.

John Garrity: It strikes me that something like Fox winning the Open Championship tells us what was wrong with LIV Golf or any of the concepts that Greg Norman and others had that the game would be better if the best players and the best players alone were competing against each other all the time. And I don't agree with that at all. Because the minute you limit it to the “best players,” you create a permanent list of best players and there's no real competition and it spoils the game. There's a hundred guys who are capable of winning a major championship, even if they've only won once or never, on tour. The difference between the great players and guys like Fox is not that great. ⛳️

If you enjoyed this issue of Box Score, please pass it along to your friends and spread the word. We would love to hear from you at [email protected]. See you again on Wednesday.