A football curse lies over the Albiceleste, she loses endgame after endgame. Then Diego Maradona dies – and something changes in Lionel Messi. He now returns to Argentina as a folk hero. And as part of a family.
A sea of tears of joy has flooded an entire country since Sunday afternoon. Here, where football meets religion, where 36 years had passed since the previous World Cup title. The government has declared a national holiday for today, Tuesday, schools and authorities remain closed. The country remains in a state of emergency.
From the national team camp near Ezeiza International Airport, it will be a long drive for Lionel Messi and colleagues to reach downtown Buenos Aires where they will present the trophy to the crowds. A parade, a triumphal procession to the obelisk, like Argentina has never seen.
On Sunday alone, well over a million people were on the streets there and millions more across the country after the decisive penalty was sunk in the net. From the Rio de La Plata to Antarctica, people put their hearts into songs and tumbling dances. “Somos campeón!”, we are world champions. Argentinian media write that never since the return to democracy in 1983 had so many people taken to the streets and with such emotion. “The return of a people’s team,” headlined one newspaper.
family and togetherness
In Germany they say you have to be eleven friends for it to work on the pitch. The Argentines are about more: the family. In the narrow sense of the word, this means their partners and the children, who after the dramatic ending played together on the pitch with a plastic bottle. But also their homeland in South America.
Several players said with emotion that the most important thing now was to present the trophy to the public. The many millions of people who longed for him so much. Almost everyone in the squad plays in Europe, they are the sons who went out into the world to achieve something that is not possible locally. “The people deserve this trophy,” said Enzo Fernández, who was named the World Cup’s best young player. Only six months ago he moved from River Plate to Benfica Lisbon.
“I could never have dreamed of a World Cup like this,” said goalkeeper Emilio “Dibu” Martínez, employed by Aston Villa in the Premier League Family.” Midfielder Rodrigo de Paul, employed by Atlético Madrid, gushed in tears: “I love all Argentines. I am proud to have been born in this country.”
While human rights violations, the hypocrisy of FIFA and organizers and other things were widely discussed in Europe, and millions of people boycotted the tournament without heeding it, it was a historic celebration of unity for Argentina. Forgotten for a few days are the four-year economic crisis and inflation, declining real wages and other problems rending society.
A video shows how, after winning the title, someone gives a shirt of the Selección to a garbage collector who belongs to the poorest of the poor. The bare-chested man can hardly believe it, slowly pulls it on, sinks gratefully to his knees and crosses himself. A fan rushes up and hugs him, others come to celebrate while cars honk by them.
A curse disappears
The most symbolic connection is that of Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi. In his first 16 years at the Albiceleste, Messi hadn’t won a title with Argentina. But then something happens: Diego Maradona dies. The folk hero. the idol The man who brought Argentina the title in 1986, danced out the arrogant English, who was acclaimed for his “cosmic ballet”, one of the most beautiful goals in football history. His likeness is everywhere, as is his number 10 shirt. With him on the pitch, the Selección won its last title in 1993. Now, in November 2020, he is dead. Hundreds of thousands are queuing to see his body at the government palace.
Then the great curse disappears as if by magic. Messi goes from a dribbler to a hanging striker with playmaking qualities. “La pelota siempre al 10” is a well-known football saying in the region: Always play the ball to the 10, because they already know what to do with it. Messi has that role. Last year Argentina won the Copa America against eternal rivals Brazil. As South American champions, they enter a duel with Italy and sweep the European champions off the field in the final. And now: world champion.
On all three titles, Lionel Messi was the director and executor, and Maradona was no longer on earth. Can this be coincidence? Also seen at the celebrations was a flag depicting a version of Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam: Diego “D10S” Maradona as God on the right, Messi on the left. What else could be the reason?
Messi played in this tournament with more aggressiveness than ever and knew how to assert himself even without the ball. He rarely let his head hang and didn’t shy away from arguments on the pitch or discussions with the referees. His “What are you looking at, idiot” to Wout Weghorst after winning the quarterfinals against the Netherlands was one of his most Maradonian moments.
About half of the Argentines only know the footballer Maradona from stories, they had never consciously experienced a title win for the Albiceleste. The emotional quake that gripped the population on Sunday after Gonzalo Montiel’s decisive penalty kick can only be explained in a rational way. Who knows if it will be another 36 years before the next title?
All the players who will lift the trophy at the obelisk grew up with the images of Maradona in magazines and on TV kissing the golden globe, the stories of parents and their coaches, the legends, the adoration, the iconisation of a footballer as the voice of the disadvantaged, who can only make themselves heard everywhere if they are successful.
title for eternity
Diego came from a villa miseria, a slum on the edge of a highway in the greater Buenos Aires area. He was small, but could outwit everyone with his technique. His heart beat for Argentina, he carried it along with emotions in front of him, his mouth was also unpolished, razor-sharp. Maradona spoke out loud about poverty and social imbalances and became a political figure. Football is a national sport, and Diego was one of many, also because of his fallibility, his history with women and drugs. That was authentic, approachable.
Messi also has his place in the hearts of Argentines. Another place. “These are two completely different characters and players,” says a newspaper seller the day after the final when asked whether “la pulga”, the flea, is now on a par with Maradona. He has witnessed all Argentine titles. The first, in 1978, in their own country. Then in 1986 in Mexico. And now, in 2022, in Qatar. “Both are fantastic but Maradona had something Messi doesn’t have.”
He initially grew up in Rosario, an economically important city for the country. His father was a factory worker and his mother was a cleaning lady. At the age of 13, Lionel went to Europe with his family. In return, FC Barcelona will pay him for hormone treatment for Messi’s growth disorder. He’s not a speaker on the pitch. The fire for which Maradona was worshiped is evidently missing.
And so Messi was viewed critically for many years. Does he feel the colors of his country when he puts them on? Maradona coached him at the 2010 World Cup, and when Argentina were knocked out by Germany in the quarter-finals, he sat dejectedly at the press conference, defending his 10 with sad outrage. The tears he saw in Messi’s locker room proved he felt the jersey.
In the song “Muchachos”, which was played in Qatar in the changing room of the Albiceleste and became a super hit at home, Messi is part of this big family there too, and Maradona and his parents are cheering him on from heaven to win the World Cup. The players have already rewritten it on the way to Buenos Aires: Diego shall now rest in peace for all eternity. The mission is accomplished.