On November 25th, the legend football player Diego Maradona died at the age of 60, after suffering heart failure.

The entire football world mourned for it. Current football stars starting from Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi to Kylian Mbappé, and football fans all over the world express their sorrow on the social media platforms.

Among all the people who are sad over Maradona’s death, Argentines are undoubtedly the saddest, the whole country even announced to mourned for 3 days, in memory of the “ball king”.

On the other hand, people are not surprised hearing Maradona’s early death. After retirement, he failed to control his weight, and he even cut the stomach to lose weight. Drugs, alcohol, mental problems…, all these caused great damages to his health. Outside the football ground, Maradona was also not a nice man, he insulted others with evil words, as well as giving the middle finger on the World Cup stand.

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It’s hard to imagine that a retired player enmeshed in scandal can enjoy such an honor from his country and people.

Maybe, a hero who saved Argentina can have such an honor.

The Circumstances Create the Hero

Maradona was the real hero during his age. As the popular saying goes: “The circumstances create the Heroes.” At the time, football was not simply a game—it was a war without smoke which held so much meaning.

Born in 1960, Maradona had already distinguished himself in the football world since early 1980s. In the football ground, Maradona played like a rock star. He ran through the “muscle jungle” deftly with his “petite” 1.65-meter-high body.

As the core player, he had outstanding personal skills—he can dribble, he can pass, and he always opened up the situation in a flash.

If you haven’t seen Maradona’s play, the current football star Lionel Messi’s play is the most similar style. They are all little men with great talent—they are fast dribbling, leading the team towards vitory.

On the other hand, the modest Messi is not as wild and glorious as Maradona. Messi was defeated by Germany in World Cup in 2014. And even he won World Cup, his historical status is still not as significant as Maradona.

Maradona was born during the period when Argentina was in deep trouble.

Due to the military dictatorship, social conflicts abounded, economic stopped to grow, the inflation rate reached 200%, the 100-peso coin became worthless and were completely taken out of the circulation. And their only usage was being thrown to the judges in the football ground or the corps of the demonstration.

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In 1982, to regain the control of Islas Malvinas in Atlantic, Argentina declared war on the United Kingdom. Unfortunately, Argentina was too powerless facing the elite force of British army under the lead of Margaret Thatcher. And they lost the war in only 4 months. Till now, Islas Malvinas is still under the control of England, and English people call it Falkland Islands.

That war also saved and rebuilt Margaret Thatcher’s precarious reputation, and turned her into United Kingdom’s national hero.

After losing Islas Malvinas war, Argentina’s national power was badly bruised, football became their only faith after the military government’s fall down.

Ironically speaking, it’s the military government who used 700 million dollars, which takes 10% of the whole national budget, to rebuilt River Plate’s stadium, invest a brand-new television center as well as other sports related public devices.

During this economy recession and political unrest period, Argentina people could only get some comfort from watching football games on TV.

In 1982 football World Cup, Maradona was shown a red card in the game against Brazil, which resulted in their failure to reach semi-final. Even though, he still deeply impressed people with his great skills, plus his famous “1 VS 6 players” photo, which took place in the game with Belgium Team.