There were two reasons why I couldn’t sleep the night before I played for Argentina against Germany in the 2014 World Cup final in Rio.

All of the team was awake because there was so much noise – the Brazil fans had been going to our games all the way through the tournament to support the opposition and now they were absolutely desperate that we would not win the World Cup in their own backyard, at the legendary Maracana.

I did finally manage to get some sleep at some point, though, and when I woke up my first thought was ‘today is the day’.

I had already played in hundreds of football matches by then, as a boy and as a man, but when you are about to play in a World Cup final you realise that it is very special, and it is going to be the biggest game of your life.

It was always one of my dreams as a child, and that’s the best way of describing what you feel like when it actually happens, when you get there. I was like a kid again, and it was hard to think about anything else apart from ‘wow, today we can be world champions’.

Waiting for the final this time brings back lots of memories from 2014, because it was a very long day before kick-off and all that was on my mind, either at the hotel or on the way to the stadium, was whether we were going to win.

Playing for my club teams, I knew had the opportunity to win several trophies every season. Every year was a new chance and a new challenge, but this was different.

The World Cup is only every four years and that is one of the reasons it is very special. I was 29 in 2014 and wasn’t sure if I would make it to Russia four years later, so one of the other things I was thinking about was if I would have the chance to play this game ever again?

All of this made it so difficult to prepare for the game, mentally, in my usual way, even when I arrived on the pitch.

I knew I was only 90 minutes away from glory, and I could imagine how amazing it would be to win in front of all our fans.

I didn’t really contemplate the other outcome.

Frustration, anger and pain

As soon as the game starts, you forget about all of that stuff like the size of the game, or your nerves. You are in the zone.

Germany were the big favourites, because they had beaten Brazil 7-1 in the semi-finals and everyone thought they would destroy us too.

It didn’t turn out that way, though. We were a really good team, defensively very steady and solid, and we had three or four really good chances to score.

But we missed them all and, right at the end of extra-time, Mario Gotze scored Germany’s winner. That was it – all over. A close game but instead of lifting the greatest trophy in football we had nothing. It was a hard one to take.

And of course it was difficult after the game, we were in tears, crying our eyes out in the dressing room and when we got back to our hotel we went straight to our rooms for two hours.

I was feeling frustration, anger and pain but it was not long until we were back together as a team, and that really helped.

A text message was sent around saying ‘lads there is nothing we can do now. It took Argentina 24 years to make a final after 1990 so we should be proud of what we’ve done. Let’s go and have a few beers in one of the kit rooms’.

So we all met in the same room, the whole squad, and we had a beer and had a chat about what had happened.

By now it was four or five hours after the game and, although it still hurt a lot, I’d already started to realise how lucky I was to experience a game like that.

‘I still think about how close we came’

We flew to Argentina the next morning and got a really good reception from the fans there too, which made a big difference too.

We had been playing for our country and playing for the shirt so, when we saw we had made our people happy and proud, that was exactly what we needed to lift us from being so low.

I stayed in Argentina for a few days and whenever I went out, to a restaurant or just for a walk, so many people came over to say ‘thank you, for all that you’ve done’.

The final was also a moment where my whole family came together for the first time in years, to watch the game at my house, which was special for me personally when I was able to join them.

A World Cup is brilliant for bringing people together like that, and of course seeing them all made me feel better about the result too.

You never really fully get over it though, and whenever I see any clips from 2014, I still think about how close we came.

At home I have the boots I wore in that game, with my kit and my losers’ medal, and looking at them is hard even now.

When you lose a World Cup final, you don’t know how long it will be before your country is back in one, but here we are again, eight years later, for Lionel Messi’s last chance.

I remember having breakfast on the morning of the final in 2014, when Messi came into the room.

I was sat with Javier Mascherano and I said to him how I hoped that was the Messi who would score a couple of goals for us to win us the game.

It was impossible not to think like that, even when I was on the field, when I had him in my team. Everyone just thinks ‘pass the ball to Messi’ because he is the one who will make a difference.

That hasn’t changed – he has been amazing at this tournament; always the main man and the true leader of the side, and I’ve been so pleased to see him enjoy himself at this World Cup.

Whatever the result against France on Sunday, I am so proud of him and the rest of the team, but what I really want is to see him lifting the trophy this time – it will definitely be worth the wait.

Pablo Zabaleta was speaking to Chris Bevan in Doha, Qatar

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