ARGENTINA 1, URUGUAY 0
—Puebla, Monday, June 16
Of all the games in the cup, my best by far was the game against Uruguay. First, because I never once lost possession when challenged by a defender; I beat out every Uruguayan player they put before me. They didn’t see me once on their side of the field—not once—and that was key. In one of our run-ins on the field—I am not sure which one of us was downfield—I even heard Enzo Francescoli say to the Uruguayan defenders, “Do whatever you have to do to stop him. I don’t care if it means grabbing him by the jersey!” Just like that. Enzo is amazing. We got along even back then. But it was an Argentina-Uruguay matchup, and in an Argentina-Uruguay matchup, you’re grinding your teeth and not giving anything away.
They had barely made it to the round of sixteen. They had played well against Germany at the opening match, but then struggled against the Danes, who were killer, with Elkjaer Larsen (I knew him well from Verona) and Michael Laudrup, who was just a kid of twenty-two but already ripping it up over there at Juve; they had Morten Olsen, a great defender, and Søren Lerby, who “El Flaco” Menotti predicted was going to shine at the cup. A powerful team. The Danes’ second game was against Uruguay and they scored six goals against them—that’s right, six! Then the Yoruguas tied Scotland, zero to zero, and managed to qualify by the skin of their teeth, by just two points. They came in as one of the best of the third-ranked teams—counting goals, with two fewer goals scored against them than Hungary. That game against the Scots was one of the few we went to the stadium to see, because it was played at Neza stadium, near Mexico City.
We had made it to the round of sixteen, so the time had come to take a look around, to see how the other guys were playing.
I think the Latin American teams had done a better job at overcoming the obstacles: the altitude, the weather, the field conditions. We were used to that sort of thing. And, just like the Danes, the Brazilians were at the top of their game. They were the only two teams that didn’t lose a single point in the first round. The Brazilian coach was Telê Santana, and they had some great players: Zico would sub in, but as starters were Sócrates, Careca, Alemão, Júnior. The other team that qualified from their group was Spain, but they were not yet playing to their full potential. They had trouble beating Algeria, a team with players who knew what to do with a ball, like Madjer and Belloumi. They demolished Northern Ireland with two goals by my friend Careca—who was not yet my friend. For those who believed the hype, Algeria had the cup in the bag. All the better for us if they didn’t see us coming.
Mexico was the home team and they had Hugo Sánchez, who was a star at Real Madrid, but they still had trouble making it to the knockout round. I think Hugo was probably the best player Mexico ever had, but they still had trouble on the home field. Their coach was Bora “El Loco” Milutinovic—a real character. The other teams to qualify from that group were Paraguay (another South American team, see what I mean?) and Belgium, which was working its way up slowly but surely.
Just like the Soviets—it was still the USSR back then—who had a great goalie in Dasayev and a good playmaker in Belanov. They would attack like you couldn’t believe. They ended up with a better score than France in their group. And France wasn’t just Platini. It was also Amoros, Tigana, Giresse, Luis Fernández, Papin . . . But they had trouble advancing to the knockout stage at the cup, a lot of trouble.
We, on the other hand, had been doing very well, but we could have been even better. We had beaten the Koreans, three to nothing, in the first game; then we tied Italy, one to one, but we played great; and we had smeared the Bulgarians in the last game. I mean, we only beat them two to nothing, but we should have kept the pressure up—I was pissed that we hadn’t. I wanted to beat everyone. Every last team.
We finished first in our group, group A, with five points. Undefeated. Undefeated! We scored six goals and only two had been scored against us.
Against the Uruguayans, it was Pumpido, Cuciuffo, Brown, Ruggeri, and Garré; Valdano and Pasculli; and Giusti, Burruchaga, Batista, and me. Write that lineup down, because it would be the last time we played in that formation. I remember saying to the guys, “Don’t get too cocky. Don’t get too cocky. They have some good players who would kill to bring us down.” And, I went on and on, “We have to stay focused. We haven’t won anything yet.”
That doesn’t mean I wasn’t brimming with self-confidence. Especially after what we had been able to do against Italy, I was convinced that we would go far. But Uruguayans will be Uruguayans. I remembered ’79, first the South American Youth Soccer Championship in Montevideo, and then the FIFA World Youth Championship in Japan.
In Montevideo, they beat us and took the title: we lost to them in round one and then they beat us, one to nothing, in the final. It was really rough in Tokyo, though. They were brutal, but we won the game and made it to the final. I remember that game perfectly because it was so rough—they really lit into us! The goalie for that team was Alvez, and there were also Bossio, Barrios, and Rubén Paz, who kicked ass. And those were the guys we would be up against in Mexico. The rivalry against Uruguay is timeless.
We took a bus from the training camp, in Mexico City, near Azteca stadium, to Puebla, where we had played against Italy. It was just over ninety miles, and it took us less than two hours. We knew the roads—and the rituals—well. Each player knew where he had to sit. We troublemakers sat in the middle.
I remember that Valdano was staring out the window, because we drove through so many different kinds of neighborhoods. Some of them had unbelievably luxurious homes; others were very poor, with people sitting on the sidewalk cutting hair. It was like taking a tour of all Mexico in a few hours.
I don’t know what it’s like now, but the other day, when I was watching the reopening of Cuauhtémoc stadium on TV—Boca Juniors was playing in that opening game—I could barely recognize it. Thirty years ago, it had the capacity to hold thirty thousand people, and the day we played against Uruguay it wasn’t full. And the crowd was divided—more people rooting for Argentina than for Uruguay—but we didn’t yet feel any hostility from the Mexicans. There were a bunch of Argentine fans. There were hooligans too, but only the ones for Boca, with José “El Abuelo” Barrita at the head. They did go to the camp, but they never got beyond the gate. They never once came in.
One time, I remember that we were going on our usual outing to the mall, and they were outside, blocking the gate— El Abuelo and a few other guys from Boca. They asked us for some dough. They were staying at a house somewhere—I’m not sure where. The guys on the team talked about what to do, the way we talked about everything. We decided not to give them anything—and we didn’t. I think there might have been some hooligans from the Chacarita club there too—but all in all, there were no more than fifty guys. They never bothered us, and I don’t think they bothered anyone else either. Times were different—you know what I’m saying?
What I do remember perfectly was how hot it was when we started playing against Uruguay—during all the games we played at the cup, really. And at the end there was a huge thunderstorm. But what I remember most of all was that we blew them away.
I recently rewatched this game for the first time too, just to reconfirm what I already thought: we almost scored four or five times, or my name isn’t Diego Armando Maradona. We had some trouble in the last few minutes, it’s true, because we didn’t follow through on certain plays. But that game should have ended four to nothing or, at the least, four to one.
Check it out . . .
Who was our right fullback? Cuciuffo, that’s right. So why did he turn up on the left in the second play of the game? See what I’m saying? Check out the game again and you’ll see that in the first play Cuciuffo plays on the right and then turns up on the left. See what I mean when I say we didn’t have any set order?
It’s true that Cuciuffo had to keep Francescoli under control and so he followed him. Garré was a lot less mobile and had more trouble attacking. Batista and Giusti saw to recovering the ball at midfield, and Burruchaga, Valdano, Pasculli, and I were on the move the whole time. Any one of us could move center. Behind, everything went smoothly thanks to the wisdom of “El Cabezón” Ruggeri and “Tata” Brown—that wisdom straightened out situations in the game that could have cost us dearly.
Check out El Cabezón. He was great—so fast, so gutsy, so agile. We all felt more and more confident with each passing game. Now, when I watch it again, I realize that I never once lost the ball in a face-off. Not once.
There was a lot of talk during the game, as you might imagine, it being Uruguay and all. Besides, they were really fired up. But it wasn’t a violent game, not at all. There was a rumor that before the game Barrios or Bossio—I’m not sure which—came up to me to tell me to rest assured they weren’t going to go after me. That never happened. Nobody said anything like that to me, because that would have gone against the spirit of the Uruguayan player. There was some contact, of course, but nothing out of the ordinary. They came out to get me a few times, and when Uruguayans kick you, they mean it. When they go for your ankle, it hurts. Some guys might step on your foot, but a Uruguayan will straight-out hack at you. No beating around the bush.
They put Barrios on me, though it also could have been Bossio. But it was Barrios. And what I did was make him run from one side of the field to the other, from left to right and back again. And it was there, on the left, that he had to kick me a few times to stop me.
Not five minutes in and I had already shown him—and myself—that the best strategy would be to break away on the left. I had one on the right but ended up against the advertising boards. But then I broke past on the left, dragging Barrios behind me. And I kicked center from the left wing, one of those moves I love so much: squeezed between the end line and the defender, I would tear down the field and hook the ball, almost spooning it, but powerfully. Like that time. The play ended in a corner kick, but it was a sign. Barrios was a big guy, much taller than me, which is why once I got going he couldn’t catch up.
Right away we had our first almost-goal. Alvez kicked it long from the goal, and Batista brought it back upfield. The ball went past “El Tano” Gutiérrez, and I went up the left side, almost inside the penalty area, and kicked it center to reach Valdano, who was on his way there. Jorge went for a diving header, but he only managed to nick the ball, and it went out of bounds. That was, for me, our first almost-goal. But you better keep track because there are a bunch more coming.
Valdano was there doing his best for both our offense and our defense. He experienced the whole Bilardo versus Menotti thing the same way I did: we put that all aside to play for Argentina.
During that first half, the Uruguayans never, or almost never, made it into our area. Nery had no trouble blocking a center by Venancio Ramos. And ten minutes after that first shot by Valdano, I took one. A free kick that knocked the hell out of the crossbar. I used to love it when my foot would hit the ball full on. When that happens, you don’t have to see how it turns out: you know as soon as it comes off your foot that it might well be a goal. It wasn’t that time, but it missed by just an inch.
The secret is to leave your foot on the ball for a little while, to stay with it as long as you can. If not, the ball doesn’t know where you want it to go. Once, when I was the coach of the Argentine team, I told Messi just that. If you don’t believe me, just ask Fernando Signorini. El Ciego told the story in a book he wrote, because he was there to witness it in Marseilles. It was the practice before a friendly against the French, and Lio Messi—along with Mascherano and someone else—stayed on awhile practicing free kicks. He kicked it into the stands once. Annoyed, because he doesn’t like losing at anything, he headed for the locker room. Fernando gave him a hard time. “You’re heading off now, after such a crappy kick?” And Lio came back. I had seen the whole thing and I gestured for Lio to stay with me. I kicked the ball just so—keeping my foot on it—and explained it to Messi, who got it immediately.
That evening in Puebla, against the Uruguayans, I was just an inch off; I should have left my foot on the ball a second more.
So far two almost-goals—start keeping track. We played better and better as the game progressed, and the same was true of the cup as a whole: minute by minute we got better. I was so proud. And not even my daughter Dalma could fit into those little shorts I wore. What players wear now is like a skirt compared to what we had to wear. I was so thin! And so fast . . . I even had time to run downfield to recover the ball and everything. Sure, but that was thirty years ago.
At around halfway into the first half, Barrios played dirty on me for the first time. He ran right into me, hitting me above and below the waist, and stuck his hand in my face for good measure. I got another free kick but I didn’t keep my foot on the ball long enough, and it flew over the net. The one who tried to make it up to me later was Barrios, apologizing and all. It was all good; we were like perfect little ladies.
But there were a few rough run-ins and, in one of them—or, actually, in two, one right after the other—Garré was kicked out of the game. Francescoli flicked the ball past him, and Garré slammed into him. A minute later, same thing. Luigi Agnolin gave him a yellow card, which would mean that Garré couldn’t play in the next game—if we qualified, that is, because this game was still tied at zero.
But sometimes that’s how history is written. If Garré hadn’t gotten the yellow card, “El Vasco” Olarticoechea would not have been put in the game. In that game, we realized just how much talent we had on the bench. Absolutely! I mean, we were already in the round of sixteen and El Vasco hadn’t been a starter in a single game, even though he was in amazing, and I mean amazing, shape.
At the end of the first period, El Vasco had another breakaway on the left, and “El Tano” Gutiérrez almost scored an own goal against Alvez. Until then, the stars had been “Checho” Batista, Ruggeri, and Brown, not because Uruguay was getting close to our goal much—they almost never did—but because we were always anticipating what play they would make. All we had to do was get it in the net—that was it. The rest was in place. And, in the end, we did it.
At the forty-two minute mark, when it seemed like the first half was over, we started out from way downfield. I faked out Barrios twice, then looked for Batista, who fell over as he passed off to the side to Burruchaga. Burru sent the ball into the penalty area, it rebounded off of Valdano, and poor Acevedo ran right into the ball and knocked it center. It was the best assist Pasculli could have imagined. Pasculli didn’t even ask who had passed him the ball. He kicked straight away with his right foot, crossing the ball to the far goalpost. The truth is, we deserved it: the third clear shot had to end in goal.
I was happy for Pasculli. I was the one who had insisted that we buy Pedrito to play with Argentinos Juniors. For $120,000, I remember it was! Miguel Ángel López was the coach at that time. We gave the team Pasculli was playing for, Colón de Santa Fe, like twenty checks for $15,000. That’s why I had a warm spot for Pasculli. Besides, we roomed together. I saw him in good times and in bad. Because after that game, Bilardo benched him for good. I was the one who had to put up with him crying over it. It’s true, if he hadn’t made the change, I would have had to put up with Héctor.
Enrique, who said he was going to go home if he didn’t play. Enrique also had a strong personality. I wasn’t surprised that he made the team. Others were, but not me. I knew he was a great player, with something to offer in every play even though he had only played one game with the team.
He ended up being really important because he was there for all of us whenever we needed him on the field. Bilardo was always ranting about the importance of hard work, which is why he put Enrique on the team even though he had barely played any games. Bilardo had him in Toulon, but he hardly put him in. Then he was added to the roster.
For many, he ended up being one of the surprises at the cup. In that game against Uruguay, Bilardo had him warming up in the locker room—along with “El Vasco” Olarticoechea—starting at halftime. Enrique told me so himself last Christmas, which he spent at my place. He spent the whole time warming up, but Bilardo never put him in. He sent El Vasco in and told him to play more upfield, to see how that went. He put Olarticoechea in, but not Enrique, which is why Enrique never thought he would play in the next game—if we made it. He had no idea what was in store for him.
But the biggest surprise, the great revelation, was “El Tata” Brown, especially since he was under so much pressure as the one who replaced Passarella, who had jumped ship. El Tata was amazing, a real superstar on defense, and at keeping control of the ball, which he had never done in his whole goddamn life. I think this was the high point of his career; he never played like that again—and it’s to his credit that he did it there. There are World Cup players, just as there are extremely talented guys who do great for their clubs or even in the qualifiers but freeze up at the World Cup.
And then, in the second half, my show began. Right away, I put the pressure on and Agnolin called a foul for a studs-up tackle that I hadn’t committed. But just two minutes in, we mounted a counterattack, and I sprinted up the right side. “El Gringo” Giusti sent a long pass my way—I tapped it past “El Tano” Gutiérrez and avoided his attempt at foul play. I came up against Bossio and got past him—I told you my show was about to begin. From the right, I put a curl on the ball with my left foot, holding my body steady to keep the ball nice and tight. When you kick the ball straight, there’s the risk that the guy who comes to block the shot might throw you to the ground. If you put a curl on it, though, you open up to one side and the defender can’t make it—the goalie either. It’s a way to get fewer players between you and the goal.
Now they call it “ball control,” but it’s nothing new.
Anyway, I put a curl on it to get around Alvez, and it ended up with Pasculli in front of the net. He shot, but it went out past the far goalpost. Another almost-goal . . . Three so far, plus the goal, right? Valdano’s head shot, my free kick into the crossbar.
There would be more—plenty more—in the second period.
A free kick by “El Flaco” Francescoli caused Nery a little trouble—not much, just a little. And then we had another almost-goal. I was able to get rid of Barrios at midfield, which meant we had an edge, a clearer playing field. I fell over as I passed the ball to Pasculli, who broke away on the left and kicked a center straight toward the box just as Burruchaga was arriving. Burru kicked it twice, but the ball didn’t make it in. One more, and now it’s four, plus the goal.
We were so confident that even “El Gringo” Giusti tried a few shots from outside the box. Sure, they ended up in the stands, but he made a shot. He even stole one of my free kicks. He kicked it and it went long. “You’ll never do a free kick again with me on the field, Gringo, as long as you live,” I told him.
I stayed farther upfield, on the left, which was where I could cause Bossio more trouble. I didn’t want us to be on the counterattack and, the truth is, we weren’t. We always started putting the pressure on from way upfield, and our confidence was growing. I had another attempt, after a sweet pass from Burruchaga. I kicked it long range, but Alvez saved it. I’m not saying it was the greatest attempt on the goal we had, but you can add it to the list. By this point, fifteen minutes into the second period, we were clearly outplaying Uruguay.
Argentina wasn’t being cautious any longer, because we players didn’t want to be. Uruguay was being cautious, and even though they were losing, they didn’t go on the offensive. If you watch the game, the way I did, some thirty years later, you can see that we had to take the initiative in that game. Look at the way I marked my guy, always focused on getting the ball back. You’ll see that we were always gathering at midfield because we knew to start passing there. What “Checho” Batista, Burruchaga, and I did was distract them and take the ball away. That was because there were so many of us at the midfield. And you can really see that in the next game, when Pasculli was taken out and Enrique put in. That was when we started winning the World Cup at midfield.
This was when the Uruguayans started lighting into us more. Barrios went after me, and after Pasculli. And the referee, Agnolin, who had given Garré and Brown warnings, played dumb. They tripped me twice in one minute, and he didn’t say anything. They might not have done it as glaringly as the Koreans, but they did foul plenty in the second period. And I mean plenty. Some parts of my body hurt more than others—like my back, that hurt much more than the blows to my ankles or my knees. But I had Carmando, who could work magic. Magic hands. He would massage me before and after each game. When he rubbed me down in the locker room before a game, I might fall—no matter how important the game was. He relaxed me completely. He used a strange rub with mud in it. He never told me what it was, and I never asked.
They quickly put Rubén Paz in for Acevedo. Everyone thought that was going to cause us some trouble, but not at all! He managed to break away on the left side a few times as soon as he started playing, but he didn’t come anywhere near the goal. Not once.
We, on the other hand, did make it all the way. Once again, starting at midfield. Looking back on the cup, I notice a few things: stepping on the gas pedal from there, just past the midfield line, would do the other team in. That, combined with my short sprints, made a huge difference. I played with Valdano, who went straight for Alvez. He shot the ball down the right side, and the goalie came out to catch it. It rebounded off, to me, with “El Tano” Gutiérrez closing in. I beat him to it and scored with an instep drive.
But Agnolin disqualified that goal. Foul. He called a foul! There was no way it was a foul. My foot came down sideways. I complained about it in Italian. And, some time later, I ran into him at an Italian tournament. A Napoli-Roma game, I remember it was. I went up to him and said, “That was some sweet goal you stole from me—you know?”
“You know something, Diego? I looked at it later and you’re right.”
“What good does it do me to be right, you motherfucker!” I screamed at him.
“I thought it was a studs-up tackle, Diego. And it wasn’t. You took the ball and kicked it like . . .”
I never, ever, lift up my foot. Too bad. We would have brought the game to an end at that point. I’ve already lost count of all the almost-goals.
I kept complaining. In Italian I swore to him on my entire family that it had not been a studs-up tackle. But, meanwhile, we kept making our way to their goal. Burruchaga made this great center that Valdano, on the other side, headed and “El Tano” Gutiérrez kicked out of play. I kept after Agnolin.
There were fifteen minutes left, but instead of the Uruguayans trying to take us by storm at the ninth hour, as you might have expected, a real storm came. It was raining like mad! First gusts of wind and then buckets of rain. Terrible. Our blue jerseys started weighing us down like sweaters, and it wasn’t the symbolic weight of the Argentine jersey; it was because they were heavy with rain.
Barrios had to take me down twice—twice in the same way—for Agnolin to give him a warning. It was on the left side, almost at the wing, where we were driving them crazy with our counterattacks.
When I compare the game against Korea with the game against Uruguay, it seems more like two completely different cups than two different games! We were really fast this game, much faster than against Korea or Bulgaria. That happens sometimes at World Cups. Things speed up. Besides, the players get more self-confident. They have a special motivation.
And then there’s the fear factor.
I liked it, because that’s how World Cups are played. You have to be eager, to feel your best, to feel important, to know you’re representing your country. And we still hadn’t earned the respect of all our naysayers. By no means. But we were already preparing the song, “This one is for you / all you / motherfuckers.” Who were the motherfuckers? All the journalists. Mostly the journalists, actually.
It was just three minutes from the end of the game when Uruguay did that famous play that made everyone think they had us on the ropes, which was not true. It was almost a goal, though—it’s true. The ball fell short of Cuciuffo just outside the area, and Rubén Paz gave it a beautiful kick with his left foot. It was pouring and the grass was slippery. Nery Pumpido hurled himself on the ball, but it stayed in the box. “El Flaco” Francescoli gave it his all, feetfirst, slide-tackling Nery and slamming right into him. And what for? That’s all I want to know! I was really fond of “El Flaco” Francescoli—we had even been chatting before the game—but we both wanted to win, of course. We gave it our all. And he got along even better with the members of the Argentine team who were teammates of his at River Plate. But I remember that Ruggeri went right over to confront him, almost picking him up by the nape of his neck! Valdano and Brown also came tearing downfield to join the fray. I mean, there was no time left, and at this point we would do anything to run out the clock. There was no way they could get away from us. It was do or die. It was a good game, real good.
When Nery stood up—about a century later—we sprinted upfield. Pumpido stood there with us. It wasn’t breathtaking. It wasn’t something that would save a game, but it wouldn’t ruin it either. The national team’s goalie. The thing is, we had one more play—the last one of the game—with less than a minute left. I got the ball at midfield, did that spin I always used to do, and then saw a player in blue go by me. And I passed it ahead knowing that there was nobody behind me. The player was Pedrito Pasculli. I passed him the ball, and he started dribbling and went one-on-one against Alvez. He kept going—he couldn’t help himself—and Alvez ended up getting rid of him. I was as fast as a jet plane back then. See how I flicked it? I spotted Pasculli and, whop, just like that . . .
That was how the game ended, with us trying to score one more time. That’s why I say that we had a lot of chances in the second period. Pedro, Valdano, Burruchaga, me, Valdano again—we all made it down there. Plus Pedro’s goal. So the game could have ended five to nothing. Uruguay couldn’t do anything to us—they didn’t even get a shot on goal until the last fifteen minutes of the game. After that, it was all in our favor, and Rubén Paz didn’t end up mattering so much. Still, it’s a good thing they didn’t put him in sooner. But it was our fault we did not score more, not a question of what Uruguay did.
Take another look at the game if you can, and you’ll see that it was our fault—not the rain’s or Uruguay’s—that it ended one to nothing. It should have been five or six to nothing. Seriously. Because we played seriously.
And we celebrated seriously that evening too. We were going nuts. We knew that we were playing better and better, that we were quick as jet planes. But, at that point, the only planes were the ones flying overhead to take the other guys home. We were staying on in Mexico.