Fabián O'Neill, the Uruguayan soccer magician who took alcohol

The club of accursed heroes, that of Garrincha, Paul Gascoigne or René Houseman, those talents in whose weaknesses and sensitivity football finds a loophole in the demand for professionalism and productivity, fired one of its most beloved members during Christmas: the Uruguayan Fabián O'Neill, a half-star who aroused the admiration of Zinedine Zidane in their years as teammates at Juventus.

Former number 10 of the Celeste at the beginning of the century, ill-fated link between Enzo Francescoli and Álvaro Recoba, the

died this Sunday in Montevideo victim of chronic cirrhosis.

He was 49 years old.

O'Neill was born in Paso de los Toros, the same town as Mario Benedetti, according to a footballer more comfortable with poetry than with prose.

A free soul on the pitch, it took him three years at Nacional de Montevideo to move to Italian soccer in 1996, then considered the most competitive league in Europe.

Also comparable to Trinche Tomás Felipe Carlovich, the Argentine who was surrounded by an aura of romanticism -characters who were more interested in soccer as a game than as a competition-, O'Neill wanted more fun than winning.

Always fueled by legends, some of them unverifiable, one day he came out ready to pass the ball between the legs of the brave Gennaro Gattuso three times, then at Salernitana.

And he got it.

Mythology also awards him a praise from Zidane repeated in these hours by

the Italian sports newspaper based in Turin: “The most talented player I've ever seen?

Fabian O'Neill”, answered the Frenchman a few years ago.

One of the Uruguayan's daughters, who had been hospitalized for several months, confirmed that Zidane was in contact with O'Neill's family to follow the state of health of his teammate in the 2000/01 season.

El Mago, who was raised by one of his grandmothers and began working at the age of 9 in a brothel, already suffered from alcoholism during the seven years he played in Italy, from 1996 to 2002. Interviewed in 2017 by the Argentine journalist Mariano López Blasco for

magazine

On how he evaded medical check-ups at Juventus, the Uruguayan replied: "I had high cholesterol and they told me: 'You should be dead, not playing football.'

I never stopped.

Before getting on the bus to go to the games, the cooks saved me two glasses of wine.

I would take them quickly, get on and burp in someone's face.

[Alessandro] Del Piero, [Gianluigi] Buffon and all the monsters asked me: 'Did you drink wine, Fabian?'

'What if!

What am I going to take?

Milk, like you?', I told them.

You never played, did you?

Zidane went to Real Madrid, [Marcello] Lippi came as coach instead of [Carlo] Ancelotti and he was a starter there, but then I got injured”.

Today the 10 shirt cries

. Today the magic stops to remember Fabian O'Neill, one of the players who aroused the most admiration with the Nacional shirt.

He left one of ours.

See you always Magician.

👉🏼 https://t.co/P9LsMMAfGx pic.twitter.com/U4UgC66AZu

– National (@National) December 25, 2022

With 19 appearances in the Uruguayan national team between 1993 and 2003, he was also injured when he attended the 2002 World Cup in South Korea-Japan.

Without being able to play, and a faithful example of soccer players who feel much more comfortable on the pitch than off, his experience in the World Cup helped him to begin a relationship with who would be his third wife.

“[Diego] Forlán helped me write to her, turned on my computer, downloaded photos of her.

If I never understood any of that, ”he reminded him of his time at the World Cup.

Retired at the age of 29 after one last season at Nacional, in 2003, the money he had earned in his career left him as easily as it escaped from his rivals.

From his biography

–Best seller in Uruguay in 2013, by journalists Federico Castillo and Horacio Varoli-, he complained that he did not receive a penny.

Of the content he only retorted a piece of information.

“The only lie in the book, because the rest is all good, is this sentence.

I am 39 years old and I have been drinking for 30 years.

It's time to stop.'

Time to stop?

Now that's it.

I am going to drink until death, ”he told López Blasco.

Until the last drop

tells in his first paragraph how O'Neill came to play several games far from his best physical condition: “He opened his eyes and realized he was in the bar.

He looked to the sides, saw the row of bottles, the chairs on top of the table, and got up from that bare mattress where he had spent the night behind the bar at Los Fresnos, a seedy nightclub.

It was a quarter to one and he had to be at the Centenario stadium in half an hour to play against Central Español.

Fabian O'Neill was arriving late for the game.

And with a hangover.”

The Magician said dozens of times that he had 14 million dollars but that he lost everything, even his last house, to the point that he began to live in borrowed rooms.

To justify his economic debacle, he repeated a phrase attributed to Carlos Gardel, that of "Slow horses and fast women."

He came to spend $250,000 in exchange for 1,000 cows, accumulated dozens of racehorses at the Montevideo racetrack, and paid his neighbors' water, electricity, and gas bills.

"Aren't you afraid of anything?" they asked him.

-To the death.

Its the only thing.

I don't want to die yet.

Life is divine.

One of his daughters, Marina, fired him this Sunday on networks: “May you be at peace, dad.

A long time ago you had already lost the spark, the joy.

Each time he saw you sadder, sicker, with lost eyes, a drooping look.

It hurt me to hear you ever say 'I don't want to live anymore' in your few hours of sobriety.

I also hope that your journey serves to understand more about alcoholism, this disease that seduced you and all your pain since you were a child, that took away everything.

And it couldn't be any other way, (death was) the least expected day but at the same time it doesn't surprise me, you always attracted attention, so worthy of December 25, crazy.

The most important thing: I forgive you, I swear I forgive you.

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