Mexico -
A very special chapter in the definitive biographies of Diego Maradona will be dedicated to the intense weeks he spent in Mexico, where in the prime of his career he won the World Cup and also the months when, already very deteriorated, he coached in the second division.
Diego traveled to Mexico to experience two significant affairs. He was 25 years old when he had the first love affair as the great leader of the Argentina national team and 57 when he returned to coach the Dorados de Sinaloa.
Summer of '86
During the 1986 World Cup, Argentina was based in the Club America, in the south of Mexico City. Diego shared a room with striker Pedro Pablo Pasculli. The two of them were determined that this room would be "our home for a month".
The Argentinian team started the tournament without the full confidence of their fans. "They didn't know who we were", Maradona recalled, who had a tough time in the first match due to the rough play of South Korea.
Maradona became more decisive as the tournament progressed. He scored the goal in the 1-1 draw against Italy.
After each good result, the Argentinians celebrated with superstitions like going shopping at a mall in the south of Mexico City or eating at a high-class steak restaurant in a neighborhood.
Then they would return to the facilities of Club America. It was there that Mexican journalist Antonio Moreno met Maradona.
"I worked on the program Los Protagonistas de Imevisión and luckily I had to cover the Argentina national team", Moreno recalls for AFP.
"The Argentinians arrived before anyone else and Maradona dove right in to win that World Cup. Bilardo trusted him a lot. I had the chance to interview him many times on the Club America field and he was convinced that it had to be his World Cup; he was very humble, mentally at 100%, his body too, he was still a very healthy young man, I remember it very well," Moreno explains.
The young reporter from back then remembers that the Argentinian number 10, who already recognized him by the microphone cube, asked for a video copy that compiled his best plays in the tournament set to the tango "Uno."
"There was still that innocence of the players being aware of when they were being talked about on television", he pointed out.
The World Cup continued, Argentina eliminated Uruguay in the round of 16 and then faced England in the quarterfinals where Maradona played the role of villain and hero in a span of five minutes in the second half.
"I was in the broadcast of the match against England", recalls Teodoro Cano, then a commentator for Televisa.
"I witnessed the goal he scored with his hand; the play happened so quickly that most of us at the stadium didn't realize it was with his hand. Some will say it was genius, others that it was trickery, but then he made up for it with the goal he scored almost from midfield," Cano explains.
From that match, Diego boasted about "the Hand of God" because it was like taking the wallet from the English, and also about the Goal of the Century: "The goal of my life."
Maradona gave another masterful performance against Belgium in the semifinals and achieved the goal against Germany in the final.
Over the years, whenever Pasculli and Maradona saw each other, they remembered those weeks they spent in their room at Club America and said to each other, "What's up, world champion?!"
Parallel Paths
After the 1986 World Cup, Antonio Moreno continued his career in journalism and followed in Maradona's footsteps.
"I was close to him in Italy 90, in Trigoria, where Argentina was staying; I also saw the black Ferrari that his brother let him drive; in the 1994 World Cup, I had to commentate on Argentina's matches, including the one against Greece when he ran towards the camera to celebrate his great goal," he says.
Maradona stopped playing football and used to travel the world to play exhibition matches; then he became a coach.
Moreno, on the other hand, partially left his communication work and took on the project of the Football Hall of Fame, located in Pachuca, Mexico. Maradona was part of the selected group in the first induction ceremony held.
"He couldn't come to the Hall of Fame in 2011 when he was inducted because he was coaching in Saudi Arabia," recalls Moreno, the director of the venue.
An Autumnal Love
In September 2018, the Dorados de Sinaloa made worldwide headlines by hiring Maradona as their coach. They wanted to promote to the first division with him.
"I want to give Dorados what I missed out on when I was sick," the Argentine offered in his presentation.
"Today, I want to see the sun, I want to go to bed at night," added Diego, who spoke and walked with difficulties.
Still, Diego did something with the Dorados that led them to the finals of the Apertura-2018 and Clausura-2019 tournaments.
The whole state of Sinaloa was enchanted by him. Even when the state suffered from flooding, Maradona made a call to support the victims throughout Mexico.
At the same time, Antonio Moreno stayed in contact with the Argentine; he had plans to bring him to the Hall of Fame induction ceremony in 2018 to honor former goalkeeper Hector Miguel Zelada, his teammate in 1986.
"I already had a plane ready for him," recalls Moreno, who couldn't count on the number 10 because the Dorados were focused on the final phase.
"I must have talked to him four or five times; his voice was already like someone who is half asleep and half awake. He was very brief with his words, you would hear him use monosyllables," Moreno details.
Maradona left the Dorados in June 2019. The following year, his death on November 25 caused sadness in those who saw him triumph in Mexico.
"We saw him in his prime here, performing incredible things with the ball glued to his foot. He was a wizard," Teodoro Cano sums up.
For his part, several hours after the news broke, Antonio Moreno was still in shock: "When years go by, you will remember the moment when someone told you, 'Guess what? Maradona died,' and you couldn't believe it! One suddenly thinks that legends like Maradona are immortal." (D)