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Only just turned 60, grew up as a child of the 80s, 1986 WC was the first i remembered so Maradona was the main man, what a player, took a hell of a beating every game, but still managed to keep going, even with all the bad stuff
RIP
My only memory of him is his cheating against England and then him becoming a very fat drug user.
I am struggling a bit to decide whether I feel bad about this. Yes, a fleetingly wonderful footballer but he was - and will always remain in my eyes – a cheat and he comes with so much other baggage off the pitch too.
My only memory of him is cheating against England
If you remember that bit, surely you will remember what was arguably one of the best goals ever scored just a few minutes later though?
My only memory of him is cheating against England and then him becoming a very fat drug user.
Yup, shame about the drugs.
To be fair, i think growing up in Scotland meant he was seen as a bit more of a hero back in '86 ;o)
The greatest player I have seen in my football watching lifetime (I'm 52).
Edit: And English
Did bloody well to make it to 60.
He vaccinated you English.
86 was the first WC I can properly remember. Whilst many English still moan about the Hand of God, the Feet of God are what I can remember. Glorious footballer, RIP.
My only memory of him is his cheating against England and then him becoming a very fat drug user.
What a myopic roaster.
I'm amazed he made it this long. If you can put on that much weight while doing that much nosebag, you must be eating about three cows a day.
You can't say he didn't enjoy himself
If you remember that bit, surely you will remember what was arguably one of the best goals ever scored just a few minutes later though?
Nope, just remember being gutted that he got away with cheating against my team.
What a myopic roaster.
Ah well, at least I'm being honest.
Very flawed footballing genius. Too early to go, but you can't say he hadn't lived.
I'm slightly shocked that he was younger than me, I always thought he was about five years older.
"Flawed genius" as the BBC put it does seem apt but up there with the greats of the game.
RIP.
Flawed genius who has kicked his last football.
The hand of God came down and took him.
Saw him at Wembley in 1980 and he showed then what he was capable of. No one came close to his incredible ability, but he definitely spoiled his legacy with that handball goal.
As binners says, that amount of weight, on that amount of beak is insane!
RIP, flawed genius who won the world cup with a relatively average team around him. He also scored one of the best ever WC goals.
just remember being gutted that he got away with cheating against my team.
Bobby Robson talking from the grave?
Watch his film on Netflix, might explain the demons that haunted him. One of greatest and best athletes that’s ever lived. Cheated yes, but so did Thierry Henry.
just remember being gutted that he got away with cheating against my team.
Bobby Robson talking from the grave?
That's how I saw it at the time. 🙂
Some" great" comments on what is after all a RIP thread
Cheated yes, but so did Thierry Henry.
And every other player on the planet.
Diego Maradona was a great footballer
20 years coked out his tits, an alcohol dependency that he never got over , obesity, and 2 previous heart attacks..he did well to make it this far.
On a more positive note..Best player ever imo. Took a decidedly average Argentine side to 2 world cup finals, winning one of them. And scored the greatest world cup goal I can remember.
Lived fast and died only relatively young. He did well to get 60.
Various documentaries I have seen about him make it clear he was the type of bloke who could be led astray massively - mainly because he went looking for it, but also because he was a proper rags to riches in no time story. To say he was emotionally unequipped to deal with it like Roger Federer is an understatement!
His death-embrace relationship with Naples was borderline terrifying.
But a magician with the ball at his feet.
RIP.
Honestly thought he was already dead due to his lifestyle post football career.
If I was Maradona, I'd live just like him... Fantastic, poignant tribute from Manu Chao. Clip of him singing it to the man himself:
Shame I can't find a version with subtitles as it sums up a lot of what's said above.
One of the most iconic football pictures ever
God wanted his hand back.
Made football entertaining for a while.
As said, the Maradona documentary is definitely worth watching.
The greatest ever in my opinion , The second goal against England was fantastic but I still think the goal against Belgium in the same campaign is even better. What he did taking Argentina to winning the world cup single handed is second to what he did taking Napoli to success.
Flawed yes , but he wouldn't have been the character he was without the erratic behaviour. Always above Pele for me as Pele played most of career with Santos then in an inferior American league.
Rest In Peace El Diego ...
RIP lad. Superb footballer and the documentary is great.
Re: Belgium - they were a good team at that time too. This is worth a read:
https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2014/jul/05/diego-maradona-belgium-famous-photo
He wouldn't have got in the Spurs team the follow year ... Clive Allen scored 49 goals !!
Saw Clive at the tip last week 🙂
Him and Best, greatest ever.
RIP - what a player, inspirational for Argentina and Napoli. The documentary is great, and a great insight into the suffocation basically in Naples, links with the Mafia etc.
Pedant mode - wasn’t his second goal v England an OG? 😃
I'm guessing the Welsh folk didnae really take to Joe Jordan either but the missing front teeth giant was another hero
I wonder if var would have picked up Diego and Joe's misdemeanours
had some good music but i preferred the earlier stuff.
Nope, just remember being gutted that he got away with cheating against my team.
We all were, 34 years ago... anyway, blame the ref or blame Shilton for being outjumped by a midget.
Any keeper could be outjumped when they weren’t expecting an arm suddenly appearing above the opponent’s head and when they expected the referee / linesman would see it and disallow the resulting goal. We wuz robbed that day.
If you think England deserved to win that match you need your head read.
There's a Mexican documentary on Netflix about him managing a team there which is also well worth a watch.
Fascinating character and you can't help but like him even when he's being an absolute prick.
The Latin Gazza.
But better at football. And drugs.
Shilts should have been hung drawn and quartered for letting him get to the ball.
He wouldn’t have got in the Spurs team the follow year … Clive Allen scored 49 goals !!
Saw Clive at the tip last week
It may well have been Clive Allen (can't remember) but I remember hearing a young-at-the-time Spurs player tell a story from that game, it was Ardiles' testimonial or something, that's why Diego was there. Anyway, Maradona arrived with no boots and Allen had the same size feet so offered him his brand new ones, Diego refused and insisted on playing in Allen's old ones that were about to be binned as he didn't think it was right to take a young player's boots off him. None of them could believe what he was capable of with a ball when they saw him up close.
Universally recognised as the most cheated footballer in history, booted from pillar to post, an absolute maniac of a man, but my god what talent.
A pleasure to watch.
I went to bed in tears after the (to my 8yr old mind) injustice of the 86 QF.
But I don’t think DM was any more of a cheat than any other sportsperson who has made a deliberate foul/dive/other. Michael Owen against Argentina in 1998 and 2002, for example.
Correct, it would have been the exact same if Peter Reid or big Butcher had hoofed him up in the air at the second goal, but that's viewed as okay.
Prior to 1990 defenders could get away with on the field assault. Probably if he played in this era he’d be unstoppable.
How do I embed a tweet?
One of my favourite sporting images ever, the fear and anticipation....
Saw this on Reddit. Young Diego in Glasgow, 1978 just before Argentina played Scotland. He's leaning out a window of The Grand Central Hotel looking up Hope Street.
Thought this was brilliant
That June day, at Hampden, not only did 62,000 Scottish fans get to see a global superstar in the making, Maradona also scored his first international goal. It made it 3-0, after he assisted Leopoldo Luque to score the first two. Arthur Graham got a late goal for Scotland. The final score was 3-1.
Graham recalls: 'What I remember is being in the tunnel before the game. Argentina were world champions and had some big, tough men who looked like real footballers. Then there was this little fella who looked like a ball boy.
"He looked like a mascot, just a wee boy. I kind of acknowledged him as if to say, 'All the best, son, you'll need it' — the size of him. Then he started beating players as if they weren't there."
Come the final whistle, Graham was magnanimous in defeat.
"I wasn't one for swapping shirts but at the end we looked at each other as we walked back to the tunnel and did it.
"The whole crowd warmed to him because of how he'd played. I haven't got the shirt now, it went to charity."
The second one..? "Wish you were punching this high when Maradona was next to you!"
😆
That's the one dez!
That's a cracking picture Bob.
My first Scotland game with my mates (had been plenty with adults) was when we beat Argentina 1-0 at Hampden, Stewart McKimmie scoring a rocket! Remember being on the train on the way up and hearing Maradona was injured and wouldn't play, was absolutely gutted.
Its an amazing documentary , loved his early coach at Napoli stating he would effectively die for Diego but not for Maradona. To which Diego states he would still be back in the slums if it wasn't for his alter ego Maradona. The footage of him playing tennis with Claudia was pretty touching looks like a loved up young lad, Also his dad stoking the BBQ in Mexico for the national team . He seems really endearing at times even in the Netflix series about the mexican team .
Also brings back how cool world football was in the 80's , the strips , the wild tackles , the old skool massive stadiums and the passion I feel we have lost most of that in the modern corporate game. Loved the anti Bush T shirts he wore he really new how to wind up the establishment with his love of Castro and Guevara.
His auto biography El Diego is really worth a read. He will be missed and even my 17 year old son was choked yesterday when we found out of his passing.
Speaking of wild tackles... Goikoetxea's infamous tackle was awful.
😱😱😱
If he played today he'd still be the best by a distance. It's all hair gel, Instagram, play acting and tattoos now. He was hard as nails and could stand up to the hatchet men.
If he played today he’d still be the best by a distance. It’s all hair gel, Instagram, play acting and tattoos now. He was hard as nails and could stand up to the hatchet men.
I don't know if you can really say that. It's a completely different game now, defenders stay on their feet now, players diving in was like a gift for Diego. The fitness levels are far removed, and the consistency that the likes of Messi and Ronaldo have shown over a very long period is something that he may have struggled to match. Messi can take a two footer as well as anyone ever has.
It's very difficult to compare, I'm not disagreeing with you, I just think comparisons are unfair.
It is difficult to directly compare but don't forget that Maradona's well documented off-field excesses seem to have started during long periods of being injured by horrendous tackles. He was as fit as anyone until he started falling apart. Once on the slippery slope of injuries, pain and addictions he was never the same but still better than everyone else at that time.
The level of protection he would enjoy today would certainly have given him a much longer career.
Another thing to note that at that time there weren't many other superstars in Football so he was huge. Enzo Francescoli was probably the nearest thing to him. Players like Zico we're towards the end of their career, others players were a little bit younger or less experienced on the world stage, like Lothar Matthaus, Prosinecki etc.
I see that the mourning for him in Argentina turned into a full scale riot with water cannons and everything.
I reckon he'd have approved of that
If he were playing today he'd have so much more support and guidance.
Even if he were injured, he'd be more likely to be hammering the Xbox than the gak in his downtime.
If he were playing today he’d have so much more support and guidance
We can never be sure that would have worked with Diego. Never did Balotelli much good (in no way is that a comparison!)
🤣🤣🤣
Courtesy of today's Popbitch...
Diego Maradona was so nervous when he paid a visit to the Vatican that he had to be escorted to a side room to have a cheeky nose-up before meeting John Paul II.
If you're wondering whether it was a smart idea for him to hoof a quick sharpener ahead of his introduction to JP2, this is how Maradona later described the encounter in his autobiography:
"So, yes, I fell out with the Pope. I went to the Vatican and I saw that the ceilings were made of gold. And I heard the Pope saying he would take care of the children, but if so, sell the ceiling, tiger! You've got nothing going for you. You were only a goalkeeper!"
And...
When Maradona played for Napoli he would always arrive back from Argentina carrying two footballs, which he would hold up as he got off the plane for a photo opp. Each ball contained a kilo of cocaine.
And putting Gary Lineker to shame in the TV punditry stakes...
https://twitter.com/espnuk/status/1066991711929466880
Talking of how defenders were allowed on field assaults....
This time on an inferior Argentinian player, but one who also enjoyed a bash on the 'Peruvian Marching Powder'.
Someone once said that if you watch the slow mo of this it should be set to 'Adagio for Strings' as it is reminiscent of Platoon.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KeRlJJbtdHc
Totally nicked from the Fretboard.
I still can't believe that Caniggia played for Dundee & Rangers. I remember it well but it's pretty out there but tame compared to his private life
Maradona would definitely approve of that one!
England cheating Maradona.
El Shalimo, yeah, Cannigia was awesome up here, a total professional, not what we were expecting!.
Cannigia was awesome up here, a total professional, not what we were expecting!.
Indeed a mad time with the Marr brothers they also had Ravanelli as well. Did them no good like. 🙂
I'm sure he lived in the west end of Glasgow after he retired, not sure if he still does.
At 35, he was still some player.
“So, yes, I fell out with the Pope. I went to the Vatican and I saw that the ceilings were made of gold. And I heard the Pope saying he would take care of the children, but if so, sell the ceiling, tiger! You’ve got nothing going for you. You were only a goalkeeper!”
I now love the man