The moment when all Argentines probably loved Maradona: After winning the 1986 World Cup final
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David Cannon / Getty Images
When Diego Maradona turned 60 at the end of October, he gave a single interview and gave the Argentines a glimpse into his soul.
He was not sure whether his country and the people love him and will keep him in good memory, he told the Argentine daily »Clarín«.
"I am forever grateful to people, they surprise me with their affection every day, I will never forget that," he said.
"But sometimes I wonder whether they will continue to like me, whether they will always feel the same way."
It almost sounds as if Maradona anticipated his death, or he was particularly thoughtful because of the round birthday.
But he has hit a point with his words, which affects himself and the Argentine people.
Maradona and the Argentines - that was a relationship of love and gratitude, of affection and devotion on the one hand.
And of rejection, disappointment and rejection on the other hand, which connected the player with the most football-crazy people in the world.
The Argentines loved him for what he gave the country in terms of football, especially the 1986 world championship title in Mexico at a politically difficult moment.
The victory against archenemy England in the quarter-finals with the "Hand of God" will remain unforgettable, especially after the defeat in the war for the Falkland Islands four years earlier.
A master of shrewdness
"After the difficult years of the dictatorship and the defeat against England, he managed to restore pride, national self-confidence and an identity through football," says Lucho Olivero.
"Thanks to Diego we walked around the world for ten or twelve years with puffy chests because he gave Argentina and the planet so much joy," said the reporter, who knew Maradona and interviewed him, in an interview with SPIEGEL.
And he was a master of shrewdness, mastered art and rogue pieces, and now and then sprinkled his genius with cheating, nobody could let five be as straight as he, says the football author Gustavo Grabia.
“That's deeply Argentine, that's us, that's how we get on.
We have always loved him for that, Leo Messi doesn't have anything like that and never will. "
But the Argentines have been increasingly joking with the way Maradona lived his life outside of football.
His drug use, the proximity to the Camorra in his time in Naples, the doping, the telenovela-like confrontations with his family, the unrecognized children, the crashes, the appearances at the 2018 World Cup in Russia in a not sober state.
His devotion to presidents like Cuban Fidel Castro, who also died on November 25th four years ago, Venezuelan Nicolás Maduro, and Russia's Vladimir Putin.
"He was the main actor in a reality show in an endless loop," writes journalist Julio Chiappetta.
"We have always loved him for that, Leo Messi doesn't have anything like that and never will."
Gustavo Grabia, football writer
But a few hours after the death a sentence went through the country and the social networks, behind which the whole Argentine people can gather.
"No te juzgo por lo que hiciste con tu vida, te amo por lo que hiciste con la nuestra".
I am not judging you for what you have done with your life.
I love you for what you did with ours.
"And Diego gave us sheer luck," says Olivero.
No Argentinian is angry with him or hate him.
Some are rather disappointed with what he has made of his life outside of football.
"But he had what Messi will never have, this absolute leadership mentality on the pitch, this patriotism, the blue and white heart."
Maradona had names in his homeland that expressed all of this.
In puns and nicknames, Diego became "El Diez" (The 10) or "El Dios" (God).
He was the "Pibe de Oro", the golden boy, the "hand of God", and yes, he was divine for the Argentines and even got his own church.
The »Iglesia Maradoniana«, founded by hundreds of thousands of Maradona fans all over the world.
She has her commandments and her prayers.
"Diego, hallowed be your left foot" is one of the central tributes.
Maradona loved the extremes, not the mediocrity, only at the top or at the bottom.
That was very close to many Argentines.
Years ago he was already concerned with the finiteness of his earthly existence, but scarcely enough he missed death earlier, in 2000 he had a heart attack.
In an interview he therefore revealed what should be written on his tombstone: "Gracias a la pelota".
I thank the ball.
For the reporter and Maradona expert Lucho Olivero, Diego will hardly be able to die.
"Today you have the feeling that his death is fake news, the Argentines don't want to believe that Maradona is really dead," he says.
“He may be able to walk physically.
But in our hearts he will always live on. "
Icon: The mirror