Index – Sport – Deceased Diego Maradona

Diego Armando Maradona died on Wednesday at the age of 60, according to Clarín. His death was caused by a respiratory arrest. A week after his 60th birthday, the Argentine icon was successfully operated on for cerebral edema and then returned home. In his latest photos, Maradona looked 80 years old, a man whose body is racked with terrible suffering.

According to the newspaper, Diego Maradona could only walk with the help of two assistants, his heart was working at 30 percent due to his old addiction to cocaine. Maradona weighed over 120 pounds, underwent gastric bypass surgery, and struggled with severe alcohol problems. After his career as a knee player, he never fully recovered, his ankle was broken several times, Clarín writes.

Maradona made his debut in the Argentina Juniors adult team in 1976, just over 15 years old, ten days before his sixteenth birthday, marking the beginning of a career like no other. Soon he also scored his first header goal against a team called San Lorenzo de Mar del Plata. He has served the rojiblancos for five seasons, scoring 115 goals in 167 games. He has become a top scorer in his last two years, so it is not surprising that he was signed by one of the most important teams on the continent, Boca Juniors. He was able to double down in his yellow-blue suit from his first match, then won the 1981 Argentine Championship with his new club and became the top scorer for the third time in a row.

Maradona already made his mark in Europe at the time, certifying a world record of £ 30 million for Barcelona, ​​which he strengthened over two seasons, collecting a Spanish Cup, a League Cup and a Spanish Super Cup. Despite everything, he did not really fit into the Catalan team, one of the Athletic Bilbao players, Andoni Goikoetxea, caused him a serious injury, and a few months later he actively participated in a massive brawl against the Basque team.

Breaking his previous record, in the summer of 1984 he bought Italian Naples for £ 6.9 million, where he had already found his place. The team’s history is also largely due to Maradona’s two Serie A championships thus far, but in addition to a cup and a super cup, he caused quite a sensation when he also managed to win the UEFA Cup cup with the Italian national team. During his seven seasons in Italy, he scored 115 goals in 258 games and once won the title of King of Goals.

After Maradona was sanctioned for a doping offense, he strengthened with Sevilla for a year and then returned to Argentina in 1993 to play seven games for Newell’s Old Boys. After a one-year failure, he returned to Boca Juniors in 1995, playing in just thirty games in his last three seasons and scoring just seven goals. He played his last game on October 25, 1997, with Boca winning 2: 1 away from former rival River Plate, with Maradona announcing his retirement five days later.

Because César Menotti, the then federal captain, still considered him too young, Argentina won the local 1978 world championship without him. He scored his first goal for the national team against Scotland in 1979 and then won the World Junior Championship the same year, helping his home team with six goals. The real breakthrough, however, was for him at the 1986 FIFA World Cup. Argentina won its second world title, of which Maradona, who chose the golden ball of the tournament, took the lion’s share with a great game. . He scored the two most famous of his five goals against England. First he put the ball into the net with his hand (“God’s hand”), then with his chosen goal of the century, during which he attracted almost the entire course, he advanced Argentina to the semifinals, where he could also double, and then he led Albiceleste to victory in the final.

Although they also managed to lead the national team to the final with a less convincing match at the 1990 FIFA World Cup (such as a loss to Cameroon), the FRG fought back for a defeat four years earlier and defeated Maradona with a penalty. In 1991, a doping test came back positive, for which he was banned from soccer for 15 months, and he did not return to the national team until October 1993. At the 1994 FIFA World Cup, a banned substance, Ephedrine, in his organization after his second match of the group stage, so he could no longer participate in any more matches.

As a coach, he was first coach at Deportivo Textil Mandiyú and then at Racing Avellaneda in the mid-1990s, but both of his appointments fell through. As of 2008, he officially became the federal captain of the Argentine soccer team. Many criticized him for his selection principles, but he eventually managed to lead his team to the 2010 World Cup, where the Argentines advanced to the front of the group and ultimately withdrew from the quarterfinals. In September 2018, it was announced that he had become the coach of Dorados de Sinaloa, Mexico.

(Cover image: Diego Maradona raises his fist after his World Cup semi-final goal against England on June 22, 1986. Photo: POOL Nuevo / Reuters)