Ukraine beat Scotland and demonstrate how sport works, plus more Lionel Messi magic - The Warm-Up

Generally speaking, a team becomes the neutrals' favourite by playing attractive football, or fielding interesting players, or going about their business in a charming and endearing fashion. These things are all true enough of Ukraine, of course, and yet the ongoing Russian invasion, the background of bloodshed and chaos, made last night's playoff an altogether stranger affair.

This game should have been played in April. Half the Ukranian team hadn't played a game since the war began. The team needed special permission to travel, since all Ukrainian men are required under martial law to remain in their homeland. Rarely can so many not usually bothered have been so keen to see a team win. Rarely can an opposition anthem have been so well received.

But in the end, any worries that Scotland might make themselves unpopular by winning, or might find themselves on the wrong end of some mysterious narrative destiny, were laid to rest. Ukraine were the better team, and Ukraine won by playing the better football.

The suggestions before the game that Scotland should step aside, or somehow help to contrive a Ukraine victory, were obviously daft and were treated with the contempt they deserved. But that daftness reveals something worth considering. The value of sport comes through the playing of sport; the winning of a game or the reaching of a World Cup is special, for those sides that don't do so as a matter of course, because it is a thing that is earned.

Presumably Ukraine's football administrators would have been delighted with a bye. Maybe even a couple of the players, here at the end of a long and very strange season. But the value of last night's win comes not just in being a step closer to the World Cup, but in taking that step: it is this that sublimates the sporting achievements of 11 or so individuals into the pride and joy and delirium of millions. It is the getting of the result that makes the result matter.

Besides, who needs a team to contrive defeat on purpose, when they can instead contrive it by sweet accident? Ukraine can pass the ball sharply and move it around cleverly, and yet it was a simple chip over the back line, a lovely touch and dink from Yarmolenko, that broke the game open. Andy Robertson, holding the line where the line should be, put his hand up confidently and waited for the flag to come. The rest of his defence looked around awkwardly. Say what you like about the narrative, but it can't play anybody onside.

Call it the Finalissima. Call it the CONMEBOL–UEFA Cup of Champions. Call it the European/South American Nations Cup. Or even the Artemio Franchi Cup: it's a sign of absolute quality when a trophy has had more names than contestations. But there will be no arguing with the result. South America is the best continent, and Europe is in the mud. Argentina's 3-0 victory arguably flattered Italy.

How did the continent end up with such an inadequate champion? Well, Italy's triumph at Euro 2020 (but really 2021) was thoroughly deserved — it's hard to win a whole tournament by accident — but it was never a victory built on blowing the opposition away. It was scrappy, which we mean as a compliment: a victory built on surviving through the bad bits, capitalising on the good bits, and holding their nerve throughout.

Such a team places great weight on its difference makers. And last night, with Insigne, Immobile and Chiesa all missing and Spinazzola limited to a second-half cameo, Italy lacked any kind of threat. Argentina could play patiently, calmly, at ease in the knowledge that if they lost the ball they wouldn't be in much danger, and getting it back wouldn't be much trouble.

By contrast, the other side had Leo Messi. It took him five minutes to touch the ball and about 20 minutes to get going, to shake off the dust of a strange season. Then the game was his. He made the first, he controlled the game until the second, and then Operation Get Messi A Goal began. That failed, to the amusement and disappointment of the bouncing Argentines in the crowd. But it failed productively, right at the last, when the ball squirted free for Paulo Dybala to slot home.

Just a friendly, of course. A contrived excuse to fill Wembley, a trophy last contested in 1983. But that from that delay came a nice historical resonance: the last captain to lift this cup was Diego Maradona. And from the game came the suggestion that Argentina are going to be awkward opponents in Qatar. Messi, Lautaro Martínez and Ángel Di María dovetail wonderfully as a front three, the central defensive partnership is firm and unpleasant, and Emi Martínez does a good line in authoritative pointing. And there's depth on the bench: as well as Dybala's late cameo, last night was Julián Álvarez's first appearance on English turf. And he looked, to use a technical term, dead quick.

As the famous Dutch saying has it, you can't make an omelette without first binning off a few youth players. Yesterday, Manchester United announced the departure of both Paul Pogba and Jesse Lingard, who joined the club at the ages of 16 and 9 respectively. There's probably a cheeky Erik Ten Hag Disrespects United's Tradition Of Playing The Kids angle here, if anybody wants it.

There's also a United Are Rubbish At Transfers side to this: that's two 29-year-old internationals leaving for nothing. Neither will be short of offers, and both will have decent careers from this point on. The kind of careers that some club somewhere might have paid for. United's unhappy knack in the transfer market applies just as much to the out door as the in.

But at the same time, neither departure represents a body blow to United's impending rebuild. Lingard never quite made the jump from useful squad player into first-team regular, and his departure has been anticipated since well before Ten Hag's appointment was announced. It will be a departure felt more in the heart than the head.

As for Pogba, well, his second spell at United has been one of moments, and not enough of them. Three coaches came and went, and nobody quite worked out how to get him going or where to get him playing. Arguably the most successful of those experiments was a one-off, when José Mourinho deployed him as a midfield target man against Ajax to win the Europa League.

Who is to blame for that? Choose your fighter. Either the club let him down with a parade of inadequate managers and teammates, or the player himself checked out early and never really checked back in. He just needed a defensive midfielder! He was saving himself for France! He was injured a lot! He was "injured" a lot! Expected assists! Haircuts! Graeme Souness was wrong and a bit obsessed! Graeme Souness was right and a bit obsessed!

United's recent history in a microcosm, in other words. Expensive, flawed; failed or failing or both. And it's here we see his true value, and what we have all lost with his departure. He was never United's star man, but he has been a linchpin of The Discourse, and we all thank him for that. Chances are, his next club will be a little more sensible. Chances are we may never have arguments so good again, and so endless.

A delightful moment here, as Graeme Souness smiles and accepts the applause of the crowd. The Warm-Up is choosing to believe that he knew it was for the teams coming out to warm up, and was just playing a little joke on us all, but we're happy either way.

Speaking of those old Artemio Franchi games, here's Argentina against Denmark from 1993. Of note: Peter Schmeichel's goalkeeping jersey, that great one with the neon spots. Claudio Caniggia almost managing to miss from less than a foot out. And a shootout that will confirm what you've been suspecting: footballers really are better at penalties these days.

Today we're heading over to the Athletic, where Adam Crafton has been speaking to Ukrainian supporters and nationals in Glasgow, as they followed their team through a remarkable win in extraordinary circumstances.

"Since laws enacted on February 24, all men aged between 18 and 60 are ordered to remain in Ukraine to protect their land. It is one reason why so many women and children were visible in the Ukraine end at Hampden Park, many of whom have taken refuge in Scotland after fleeing their war-torn homeland. As the cameras panned in before the match, children raised signs reading 'Stop War'."

A super duper helping of Nations League with sprinkles on. Northern Ireland face Greece and the Czech Republic take on Switzerland, but the real headline fixture is Spain vs. Portugal. The Peninsula Derby, as nobody calls it.