Column: Lionel Messi is playing for a title and his legacy in the Copa America final

REPORTING FROM GLENDALE, ARIZ. —  Two fans paid StubHub more than $5,000 each for tickets to Sunday’s Copa America Centenario final between Argentina and Chile in East Rutherford, N.J. (5 p.m. PDT, FS1, Univision, UDN). And while most right-thinking people would consider it an indulgence to spend as much on a two-hour soccer match as you’d have to pay for a 17-day Hawaiian cruise, know that Sunday’s game could end with a sight never seen by human eyes: Lionel Messi hoisting the trophy after a major international tournament.

A five-time world player of the year, Messi is the best player of his generation — and arguably the best of all time. He was MVP of the last World Cup and last Copa America. With his club team in Barcelona, he led the world in goals twice, led his league in goals or assists six times and won 28 major championships.

His legacy, however, will rest on what he does with Argentina, and there his record has been far less stellar. Aside from two age-group titles, he has spent most of his national team career watching others collect the prizes.

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Argentina finished second in the last World Cup. It finished second in three of the past four Copa Americas. It finished second in its last Confederations Cup and hasn’t won a major championship in 23 years.

And Messi, who turned 29 Friday, is running out of time to turn that around.

Pele had won two World Cups and was a year away from a third by his 29th birthday. Diego Maradona was 25 when he won a World Cup as Argentina’s captain, one reason he remains more revered at home than Messi.

And Maradona had a message for Messi and his teammates last week: “If you don’t win, don’t come back.” So maybe it is worth $5,000 to see Messi shut Maradona up or be forced to seek asylum in the U.S. Either way, Sunday’s final will provide a fitting crescendo for a Copa America that already has broken records for attendance, TV viewership and revenue.

It was a tournament that opened with a Brazilian team missing Neymar, its talisman and captain who is being saved for the Rio Olympic, and ended with a Brazilian team missing a coach, with Dunga getting fired two days after his team was bounced in the group stage.

It was a tournament that saw Mexico run its unbeaten streak to a national-record 22 matches — only to have it end in a 7-0 loss to Chile, a national record for the worst shellacking in a competitive match.

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Jurgen Klinsmann became the first U.S. coach since the 1930 World Cup to start the same lineup in three consecutive games. And for that, he was rewarded with a group title and three consecutive wins in a major international tournament, something no U.S. coach has achieved.

Peru, ranked 48th in the world, and No. 77 Venezuela, teams that had one win between them six games into South America’s World Cup qualifying tournament, combined for four wins here, each advancing to the quarterfinals. Brazil and Uruguay, both ranked among the top nine in the world, combined for two wins in six games and were eliminated in the first round.

Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez moved within one goal of tying Mexico’s all-time goal-scoring record, while Messi, who played just 74 minutes in the group stage because of a back injury, broke the all-time Argentine record with 55 goals.

Yet despite all that history, this Copa America will end the same way last year’s did: with Chile facing Argentina.

That’s also the same way this month’s tournament began for both teams. Argentina won the group-play opener, 2-1, with midfielder Angel di Maria scoring the first goal and the injured Messi watching from the bench. Di Maria and forward Ezequiel Lavezzi will watch the rematch from the bench because of injuries — and four others may join them. Messi, meanwhile, is at the top of his game, having scored five times in the Centenario, including a free-kick goal in a 4-0 semifinal win over the U.S. that has become the signature moment of the tournament.

But none of that makes up for last year’s final, which Chile won on penalty kicks after 120 minutes of scoreless soccer.

Both teams have followed different paths since that game: Argentina hasn’t lost in 2016, with two of its eight victories coming against Chile. And Chile, which replaced Coach Jorge Sampaoli with Argentine Juan Antonio Pizzi in January, stumbled into the Centenario by losing three of its first four games after the change.

Argentina hasn’t slowed, scoring a tournament-high 18 goals in the Centenario and winning its past three matches by a combined 16-1. Chile, meanwhile, needed a penalty-kick goal 10 minutes into stoppage time to beat Bolivia in group play before its quarterfinal embarrassment of Mexico and a shutout win over Colombia in a semifinal interrupted for 2 1/2 hours by torrential rain.

If that form holds, Sunday night will end with Messi holding a trophy. But if Argentina fails again, Messi may be left holding a worthless ticket home to a country Maradona has warned him not to visit.

Either way, there are at least two people who already have decided it will be more memorable than a Hawaiian cruise.

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kevin.baxter@latimes.com