He was the unlucky one, who made his national team debut at the age of 16, but at the 17 he was not included to squad at the World Cup, where their team became the champion – he was not taken to the 1978 FIFA World Cup because of his young age.

He was the skillful one, who was the hard to stop on the field and who has suffered 23 fouls at the match – the Italians, the future champions of FIFA World Cup only in this way to stop him in 1982.

He was the valuable one, who twice was the most expensive transfer in the world – his transfer to Barcelona in 1982 and to Napoli in 1984 was a record fee for the time.

He was the brave one, who dared to move from Barcelona, the second team of the UEFA club rankings, to 83rd-ranked Napoli – and he won twice the Serie A champion title and the 1989 UEFA Cup with Naples club.

He was the perfect one, who was dribbled 90 times and has won 53 fouls for his team at single World Cup – the 1986 FIFA World Cup was his tournament.

He was the talented one, who gave 3 assists at a World Cup match – they defeated the South Koreans at the 1986 FIFA World Cup start thanks to his accurate passes.

He was the unusual one, who was both loved and hated – could the English be sympathetic him who scored them a goal by “The hand of God” at the 1986 FIFA World Cup?

He was the magician one, who scored “The Goal of the Century” – he received the ball in his own half, with 11 touches ran more than half the length of the field, dribbling past five outfield players and goalkeeper, and slotted the ball into the net against England at the 1986 FIFA World Cup

He was the geniuses one, who helped their team to become world champion, where they were not the clear favorites – Argentina won only 1 of 7 matches on the eve of the 1986 FIFA World Cup.

He was gifted, despite not being a clean striker, he managed to become the top scorer in Serie A – he was the first on the list of scorers with 15 goals in Italy at the 1987/88 season.

He was also one of us, who has experienced the bitterness of such defeats as 1-5 and even 0-5, despite all his extraordinary abilities – he could not prevent the heavy defeats of Napoli to Werder Bremen in 1989 and Sevilla to Real Madrid in 1993.

He was an irresponsible one, who was twice convicted of doping – first in 1991-1992, and then in 1994-1995, he was banned from football for more than a year.

And he was the legendary one, who was voted the best player of the 20th century and of all time in various polls…

Life goes on.

Records are also updated.

In 2017 he left the lead in Napoli’s all-time top scorer list with 115 goals – the first he was overtaken by Slovak Marek Hamšik, and then both of them were overtaken by Belgian Dries Mertens and Italian Lorenzo Insigne.

In 2018 his record as captain at the World Cups was broken – he was overtaken by Mexican Rafael Marquez, who has been the captain of his team at 17 matches for the World Cup, one match more than him. Finally a new record holder appeared in 2022 – Lionel Messi became the captain of Argentina 19 times at the World Cup.

And in 2020 Maradona lost his life…

But his fame and popularity are eternal…

He was someone who managed to be the center of attention by any behavior…

He was just Diego Armando Maradona!

Writer: A juror for prestigious football awards and an international journalist, articles are regularly published in different countries, including in the famous Kicker magazine from Germany.