GOAL OF THE DECADE: ROBIN VAN PERSIE

One hundred and seventy-one goals were scored at the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, the most in a single edition. But one of them stood head and shoulders above the rest. Or, in this case, just a head — that of Robin van Persie’s.

In a decade when two legends have made a habit of slotting in remarkable goals every other weekend, anyone not named Messi or Ronaldo had to pull off a phantasmic feat to usurp them from collective conscience. Rising to that challenge, quite literally, was van Persie, against the defending champions Spain. Once a diagonal cross was whipped in from the halfway line, the Dutch striker tore into the box and jet-packed towards the swinging ball. The header sailed a mile into the net, lobbing and stunning goalie Iker Casillas along the way. It was scored on the second day of the Cup, setting the tone for what would be a tournament for the ages. But really, as great goals go, the van Persie goal wasn’t bettered in Brazil, or anywhere this decade.

The march of time does not factor in dates and decades–theseareman-madeimplementscreated to record history, to map flashes from the pastormomentsinthefuture.soweremember the 1920s for the Flappers, the 1940s for the Great War, the 1960s for hippies and great music, the 1980s for scrunchies and shoulder pads, and the 1990s for our first email id.

These events or trends were not year-, date-, or decade-specific. They just happened in a particular moment, which, when recorded on a calendar, and categorised in 10-year bands, allowed us to chart the course of the modern age.

Several events coexisted in each decade, intrinsically linking books, political movements, cinema, human achievement, and sporting icons. So Johnny Weissmuller matches the Flappers, Don Bradman the War, Muhammad Ali the civil rights movement, Diego Maradona shoulder pads, and Michael Jordan your first email.

In this narrow but chronologically convenient context, the 2000s emerged as a golden decade for sport – it marked the coming of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo; the emergence of Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Serena Williams; the rise of Lebron James and Tom Brady; the arrival of Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps; and the consolidation as legends of Tiger Woods and Michael Schumacher.

It’s perhaps these new scientific inputs that led to the extension of the playing careers of several stalwarts from the previous decade, equipping them with the information, fitness levels, and mental agility to quell new challenges from a new breed of sportsmen.

In 2011, close to the start of the decade, when Tiger Woods was trying to make one of his first few comebacks, I’d argued that his biggest test would not be overcoming injuries or internal demons, but competing with a generation of players, more than 10 years younger than him, and ready for him in a way his peers never were. Golfers who started playing after Woods won the Masters by 12 strokes in 1997; some who picked up a club because of him, and were therefore not surprised by what he did on the course; they had trained to be like him, and to beat him.

While Woods may not be the dominant force he was before his personal and professional life went into a tailspin in 2009, this is the year he made what could be considered the greatest comeback in history at the Mas

So, all told, how will history remember sport in the Twenteens? As the era of sport’s greatest rivalry? As the time two extraordinary Olympians walked into the sunset? As the age of Messi and Ronaldo? As the decade when Sachin Tendulkar handed the baton to Kohli?

It will perhaps be known as a time of gloriwe ous certainties. An era when were enthralled by exceptional consistency and superlative sameness. Sport’s decade of un-change.