The Golden Boot That Belonged To One Man

This timeline died quietly on the final matchday, aged one tournament, when the last group of forwards refused to let one man keep the whole Golden Boot to himself.

It was a lovely world while it stood. In it, the striker in question banged in seven across the group stage and never looked back, and the Institute of Applied Finishing had to rebuild its xG model twice because the finishing kept outrunning the math. "We modeled a ceiling of five," lead striker-modeler Priya Okonkwo-Vance said, standing at the edge of the grave. "He treated the ceiling as a suggestion."

The Football Desk thrived there. It ran a daily 6am column called The Boot Watch, and by the quarter-finals the Shipping Desk was quietly tracking a container of commemorative bronze boots stuck in customs, one for every goal, budgeted at 41,000 units.

The detail worth missing: a pub in that world kept a chalk tally behind the bar, one stroke per goal, and never once had to erase it for anyone else.

Nobody was harmed in the collapse. The player is fine, unbothered, alive. Only the outcome is gone.

We are fond of long shots. This one very nearly landed.

— Timeline B. In our universe, the odds of this were 0.5%.