I’m not sure what it was that first drew me to the Argentine national team. When I was 12 years old, the first book I chose to read was Jimmy Burns’ amazing biography of Diego Maradona. I recall finishing school on Friday and hurrying home to ask my parents if they had purchased the book, which I subsequently read over the weekend. As a ten-year-old, I also kept an Argentina or Maradona scrapbook with images and newspaper cuttings during the 1994 World Cup, and I was devastated when he was ejected from the tournament.
Despite his numerous off-field mistakes, Diego Maradona has long been my football hero. I initially became aware of the British public’s hatred for Maradona when I was very young, but I didn’t understand why. England’s elimination from the 1986 World Cup had little impact on me because I was two years old at the time. So my first exposure to Maradona came from clips and footage of this incredibly great footballer. He accomplished stuff with a football that I hadn’t seen before. So he handballed a goal in. So, what? Wouldn’t we all behave similarly in the same situation? I remember Paul Scholes handballing.He scored two goals in one game against Poland in a qualifier in the late 1990s, but he does not face the same level of hostility. If cheating only matters on occasion, football morals are out the window. As for the off-field flaws, I am not defending them, but they only enhance to my admiration. I have a great regard for someone who can play the way he did in the mid-1980s while consuming that much cocaine. A sort of material you bring to the world that does everything so perfectly.
So, my love affair with Argentina began in the mid-1990s. I recall being unable to look as Gabriel Batistuta stepped up to take a penalty against Romania at USA 94 and moping off to bed as a disappointed ten-year-old when they were defeated by a fantastic Hagi-inspired Romanian team. My father brought home a video of a first-round Copa América game versus Argentina that a coworker had recorded from Sky. The obsessive monthly wait for World Soccer to be released so I could flip straight to the ArgentineSection and league tables. Keeping up with football from so far away was difficult before the internet. Getting up at 7 or 8 a.m. every Saturday to watch Transworld Sport on Channel 4 in order to view a Diego Latorre goal at La Bombonera for a mere two minutes. I began collecting videos of previous World Cups and recording any Maradona documentary on television so that I could watch it over and over.
