Diego Armando Maradona (1960-2020), special guest in all countries, found in Mexico an unexpected oasis.
El Diez won a brilliant World Cup in 1986 on the Azteca stadium.
He said goodbye to the country as a champion at its peak and returned 32 years later, beaten by excesses, to enjoy his best stages as a club coach in Culiacán (Sinaloa) where he was close to winning his first trophy as a strategist.
Its splendor and decline mixed in Mexico.
The Maradona player landed in Mexico City at the age of 26.
The Argentine team was far from being the favorite to win the World Cup.
And the first sensations of Pelusa on Mexico were not the best.
There was some anxiety among the soccer players because a year before a strong earthquake had shaken the Mexican capital.
The Albiceleste team had to settle in the training center of one of the oldest clubs in Mexico, America.
El Diez reproached the facilities for not being finished.
"It was a brothel," Maradona said, as read in the book
Mexico 86. My World Cup, My Truth.
That's how we won the Cup.
Another issue that bothered the Argentines was the height of the city, 2,250 meters above the sea.
Maradona was the center of attention for the photographers who made him pose with a mariachi hat and with the youth of America.
One of them was Ricardo Peláez.
“We had to be Argentina's sparring partner, we were training alongside them for a month.
It was an extraordinary selection ”, Peláez tells EL PAÍS.
“We came from playing against Brazil in the training center, we returned to the América facilities and Diego Armando Maradona was shooting balls at the goal from midfield.
I stood off the court with my camera.
He told me: 'Pass it on!', Describes the former Mexican footballer the day he got his most precious photograph.
That "pass it on!"
It was the only phrase that he could snatch from the Argentine, under the gaze of journalists who crowded onto some fences to try to steal a statement.
El Diez and his companions made a tradition in Mexico: shopping at the then luxurious Perisur shopping center.
Maradona made hotdogs his special diet, although the Albiceleste team became a regular customer of a restaurant called Mi Viejo, in the affluent Polanco neighborhood.
Those little moments shielded Carlos Bilardo's pupils.
Diego Armando Maradona left the mark of his dribbling in three Mexican stadiums: the Olympic University of UNAM, the Cuauhtémoc in Puebla and, of course, the Azteca, the scene where he scored two indelible goals in the history of football against England.
In the final against Germany, Diez had a moment of anger with the fans whom they had surprised with their goals weeks before.
“It screwed me that they shouted the goals from Germany.
I don't think they did it for anti-Argentines or anything like that, "he said, as he told journalist Daniel Arcucci.
“In Mexico at the beginning Argentina was not celebrated so much because the favorite, after the local, was Brazil.
In the end, people did opt for Argentines, ”says Carlos Calderón, a Mexican historian.
The Mexicans, who in 1970 years had celebrated Pele's triumph at Azteca, entrusted Maradona as the great soccer hero of the world.
The Ten had already touched the top of the world.
Sinaloa, refuge for Maradona
It took 32 years for Maradona to return to Mexico.
A sudden news shook the ecosystem of the ball: the Argentine star was going to lead the Dorados in the Mexican Second Division.
Eyes fell on Sinaloa, a state hit by drug violence.
The Maradona who returned to the country that crowned him was no longer so agile, he walked like a clumsy giant.
He had gained several kilos and had survived an overdose that led to his death.
And when he spoke his words dragged, as if they were injured.
The one who was the king of football in the eighties, returned in 2018 seen as the king of excesses.
“I want to give Dorados what I missed when I was sick.
Today I want to see the sun, I want to go to bed at night, "said the Argentine on the day of his presentation.
That day the Mexican journalists applauded him standing up.
The Maradona effect turned the club that suffered in the middle table upside down and led them to play two finals.
They both lost.
What he won was a ticket to tranquility.
After succeeding as a footballer, Maradona was a celebrity who could not walk without being harassed by a photograph.
In Culiacán (Sinaloa) people respected their environment.
“If Diego goes to Naples the square fills up.
Here they have seen him in the supermarket shopping with his partner.
On the child's day, she went to school for her baby.
He is someone authentic and his life in Culiacán is work, family and peace, ”Javier Llausás, a club worker, told this newspaper in 2019.
"From now on for us you will be El Diego de Sinaloa," read one of the corridos dedicated to the Argentine, who lived for several months on the seventh floor of the Lucerna hotel.
A deteriorated Maradona left scenes that alerted his followers: in an interview with ESPN he could not put the words together in his answer and after losing one of the finals with Dorados el Diez, he challenged some fans who shouted at him: eat!".
Maradona was able to restart his family life in Culiacán and nothing could disturb him, except his health. The Argentine resigned from his position in 2019 to travel to Buenos Aires to undergo knee and shoulder operations. A few months later he became a strategist for Gymnastics and Fencing, his last club. He could not become a champion as a coach and in Mexico, his great talisman, he almost did. The Azteca and the Dorados mourn the departure of El Diez.