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"Diego escaped from heaven and our mission is to accompany his return with joy"

2020-11-27T03:03:04.563Z


With fireworks and flags hanging from the fences as if a soccer game were being played, thousands of Argentines gathered in front of one of the usual gathering places in the Argentine capital


A man waves a flag with Maradona's face in Buenos Aires.Victor Caivano / AP

According to the condition of the gods, Diego Maradona also performs miracles after his death: after a day marked by pain, a festive vigil broke into Buenos Aires this Wednesday night.

At the close of one of the saddest days in Argentina, a carousel of shouts, songs and honks marked the prelude to the wake that will begin this Thursday morning at the Casa Rosada, which is expected to be crowded and will last until the weekend.

"Diego escaped from heaven and our mission is to accompany his return with joy and songs," said Walter Rotundo, a member of the Maradonian Church, so fanatic that he baptized his daughters as Mara and Dona, both 9 years old.

“We have to be selfish and leave sadness to family members.

Diego only gave us joy and we must fire him like this.

The first feeling was pain: now it is gratitude, "added the fan, one of the organizers of the meeting in which thousands of fans gathered at the Obelisk.

With fireworks in the background, flags hanging from the fences as if a soccer game were being played and the permanent intonation of the national anthem, thousands of Argentines gathered in front of one of the usual places of concentration of the Argentine capital.

At the height of the tribute, the fans also rehearsed an Olympic lap around the monument, while the giant screens of the Buenos Aires center showed Maradona's goals against England in the 86 World Cup.

“I'm going to repeat what (the writer) Roberto Fontanarrosa said: 'I don't care what Diego did with his life, I care what he did with mine.

That's why I'm here and I'm going to stay all night until the funeral begins, '"synthesized Nicolás, another member of the Church, with a mask illustrated by a photograph of Maradona scoring his second goal against the English.

Although there were also fans crying their tears, most of the protesters said goodbye to the day that Maradona entered immortality with songs of emotion and belonging.

"Diego did not die, Diego lives in the town" was the most repeated theme, a combination repeated in other songs, such as "Diego, dear, the town is with you."

"Maradona is the most charismatic athlete in history along with Muhammad Ali", summarized Emiliano Goggia, one of the self-summoned, next to a flag that linked the ex-footballer with Che Guevara and the word "revolution."

"Now I'm going to sleep at home for a couple of hours so I'm ready for the funeral: I asked for leave from work to get to the Casa Rosada very early," Goggia added.

While thousands of fans also gathered in another corner of the city, the Argentinos Juniors stadium, the football cradle of Maradona, Buenos Aires and the rest of the country were delivered to another type of greeting: at 10 at night, in honor to his number, motorists honked their horns and people took to the streets to applaud the memory of their great maker of happiness.

"El Diego is Argentina"

The ban on stepping on soccer fields in Argentina due to the covid-19 pandemic did not resist Maradona's death.

"It's a miracle of Diego," exclaimed a woman with a baby in her arms when the blinds of the Argentinos Juniors stadium, in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of La Paternal, began to rise after being low for eight months.

Around ten o'clock at night, the club with which the Argentine soccer legend arrived in first class let in the thousands of fans who concentrated all afternoon outside the stadium to lay flowers, light a candle, leave a shirt , a ball or any other object that reminded them of Maradona.

The sadness with which the first fans arrived gave way to an unprecedented popular party since the coronavirus paralyzed Argentine football.

“Diego is the country, Diego is Argentina, for Argentina it is everything.

I only have words of gratitude, "says Matías, 29, after leaving an Argentinos Juniors shirt at the foot of a makeshift altar." Diego is immortal, he did not die today.

He's still alive and he's going to stay alive a thousand more years, "he adds, while around him those present sing" Maradó, Maradó.

María Inés, 83, a neighbor of La Paternal, did not imagine that she would survive that young man she saw do prodigious dribbles before becoming a national idol.

“I have been on the pitch since I was seven years old and I have never enjoyed myself as much as with Diego.

I saw him score four goals for Boca, ”he recalls, referring to the historic 1980 game in which Argentinos Juniors beat the xeneize team 5-3.

"I cried for two hours, sadness prevented me from speaking, but then I called my grandson and asked him to come with me to light a candle for him."

"The one who doesn't jump is an Englishman," chanted the fans, for whom the memory of the game that Argentina beat England 2-1 in the quarterfinals of the World Cup in Mexico is indelible thanks to two historic goals from Maradona.

“Brazilian, Brazilian, how bitter you look, Maradona is, he's bigger than Pelé”, was another of the most heard songs of the night, referring to the classic rivalry with neighboring Brazil.

The alcohol and the drums increased the festive atmosphere and the feeling that the death of Pelusa is unreal, another nightmare of this dystopian 2020.

“It is a piece of the homeland.

As if cheese and sweet or mate could die ”, said Sebastián, 38 years old.

More and more people entered the stadium.

Nobody wanted to leave.

Around midnight, dozens of other fans welcomed the arrival of Maradona's body with more songs at the wake where the former footballer would be fired by his relatives during the early morning hours.

Source: elparis

All sports articles on 2020-11-27

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