Argentina's national team will celebrate their World Cup triumph on Tuesday in Buenos Aires at the Obelisk, the monument that is the traditional epicentre of sporting celebrations.
The national team, who beat France on Sunday, will arrive in the country in the early hours of Tuesday on a state airline flight and spend the night at the federation's training centre located near the airport, according to local media reports.
Argentina beat France 4-2 on penalties after a 3-3 draw in a pulsating game that was labelled by many as one of the best finals in World Cup history.
Argentines, who took to the streets in every corner of the country after winning their third World Cup, are eagerly awaiting the team's arrival to continue the celebrations.
"I want to be in Argentina to see how crazy it is. I want them to wait for me, I can't wait to go there and enjoy it with them," said Lionel Messi.
On Sunday evening, as fireworks exploded and some 80,000 people roared, Lionel Messi smiled. His Argentina soccer shirt covered by the bisht the Emir of Qatar had just draped him in – the cape reserved for top officials and sheikhs. He smiled, he paused, then he hoisted high the World Cup, a lifetime's dream realised.
For all the accolades, all the awards, the riches, titles and silverware, there had been one stain on his career resume, and it was one he erased forever on a magical World Cup night for Argentina.
"It's anyone's childhood dream," Messi said. "I was lucky to have achieved everything in this career... and this one that was missing is here.
"It's madness... look how she (the World Cup) is, she's gorgeous. I wanted her so much. I had a vision that this would be the one... she was getting closer."
On this patch of green in the Qatari desert all that mattered to the 35-year-old was to deliver the much-yearned-for World Cup to Argentina, and he did so with a virtuoso performance against defending champions France in what transpired to be a final for the ages.
Having steered Argentina to a 2-0 lead which they blew in the final 10 minutes, he then put them ahead in extra-time, before finally converting his penalty in the shootout which they ultimately won.
As tens of thousands of Argentines packed into the febrile stadium jumped and hugged and cried and screamed, so too did the Argentine team, sobbing freely and mobbing the man who has been their talisman for a generation.
It had taken five attempts, and a record 26 World Cup finals matches, but the boy from Rosario - the farm hub city some 300 kilometres north of Buenos Aires - finally delivered to lift himself alongside that other Argentina footballing deity, Diego Maradona, who had taken his nation to the title in 1986.
"We suffer, but we already have it (the World Cup)," said Messi. "I wanted to close my career with this, I can no longer ask for anything else, thank God, he gave me everything."
