So the cycle begins again. Just when it seemed the playmaker had been consigned to history, just when it seemed even those areas such as Argentina and the Balkans that had always idolised their number 10s had begun to question their devotion, so they emerged again at the World Cup, different in form, reinvented for modernity, but distinctly, undeniably there. There was Mesut Ozil, perhaps the most classical of the new breed, sliding passes through for onrushing colleagues. There was Wesley Sneijder, probing and prompting, ever alert to a shooting opportunity. There was Lionel Messi, jinking and scampering, the latest incarnation of the pibe ideal. And there, deeper-lying, was the scheming Xavi Hernandez, the cerebral heart of the best national team there has been in two decades.
‘The Point of…