"For Shilton." "For the goalkeeper Shilton." "All goalkeepers are useless." "You're not an exception." "Relax." "You were had - but don't worry." "When we were in the shower after the game, he said to me" "Jorge Valdano Argentine International "During the whole move," "I was waiting for the right time to pass you the ball, as you were running alongside me on the other side of the pitch."" "This is why I say that the mind of a genius works at an extraordinary pace, and with amazing complexity." "It's not that he just saw a blue and white shirt of an Argentine player - he knew it was me and not someone else." "To me that seems a miracle." "Diego Maradona Argentine International I always say England allowed me to score the best goal of my life " "a goal scored in a World Cup, a dream goal, a goal scored with the hand!" "La picardía is a grade of "badness"" "which takes genius a little beyond the boundaries of the law." "How beautiful!" "What have you done?" "Diego, what great happiness you've brought to the whole of the Americas!" "In Argentina we celebrated the bad goal more than the good goal, because it was against the English, who seemed to deserve it." "Shilton." "You think that you're the hero. the phenomenon." "If a ball crossed just over the line, and you swept it away without the referee seeing it, would you go and tell him that it was a goal?" "Narrated by Terence Stamp" "When the Sky Blues play, I play too." "When we play, we play to win." "Tonight, whatever it takes, we need to win." "Argentina lead 2-0." "He plays it too far." "It's out of play." "Up go the hands." "Throw-in to Argentina, who lead 2-0 in the Estadio Monumental in Buenos Aires." "Recoba to Rodrigues in the area." "In goes his low cross." "It's a goal for Uruguay, for me an own goal." "Goal for Uruguay." "Argentina were winning easily - now there's suspense." "They went to Europe to try their luck." "Eduardo Galeano Author, Uruguay and gave the world a new kind of football." "They thought that Uruguayans would be like all the rest - a child of English football - and that was true." "But what happened in South America was that this British father had children that didn't take after him very much." "The Uruguayans put on a disastrous training session." "They didn't score a single goal, they kicked the ball into the clouds, or missed it completely, kicking the ground instead." "and they bumped into each other - it was a disaster." "The Yugoslavs reported back that Uruguay would be a piece of cake, that they were a useless team who couldn't beat anybody." "This put Uruguay, a small unknown country, on the map." "The big star of the 1924 team was black" " José Leandro Andrade." "He was called "the Black Marvel" by the French press." "I'm going to tell you something." "The only countries they talked about back then were Argentina and Uruguay." "Francisco Varallo Argentine International Brazil played, but I don't remember how they got on." "People didn't mention Brazil." "My father was at that game, and he had to shout "Uruguay, Uruguay", or they would have killed him." "He had to hide his Argentine flag." "Waldemar Victorino Uruguayan International The Garra Charruía is our idiosyncrasy." "The whole of Uruguay has it, not just footballers." "We always want to push ourselves further, to come first." "We've always liked difficult challenges, and for us, football was a difficult challenge." "The Brazilian players felt the impact of the equaliser." "Roque Maspoli Uruguayan International If one touched them, they felt cold." "We realised then that although we might not have enough time, we were close to beating them." "The Uruguayans have a lot of self-love." "Alcides Ghiggia Uruguayan International They go to the games, and they don't like to lose." "So if you mix self-love with that passion for winning, you sometimes get results which aren't expected." "Hundreds of people were in tears, crying, crying, crying." "Juan Schiaffino Uruguayan International It was incredible, everybody was crying - the Brazilians because they had lost, us because we had won." "The Garra we will not lose." "The day we lose that, we will disappear." "But it will always exist." "Ezequiel Fernandez Moores Journalist, Argentina The scene of collective grief after that defeat had a big effect here." "Perón saw how a defeat in football could affect a population, and he didn't want the same thing to happen here." "Alfredo Di Stefano River Plate A forward line called "The Machine" was formed." "It was Muñoz, Moreno, Pedernera, Labruna, Loustau." "They were truly a football machine." "They could play from memory with great ability." "They played beautiful football." "In the 1950s, the stadia had more people in them than in the year 2000." "All of these stadia were built with Perón's money." "Paradoxically, they were golden years for Argentine football, but at the same time Perón was scared that Argentina might lose if they played outside the country." "If football was the national pride, they couldn't lose." "We thought there were representatives from European teams watching us." "Humberto Maschio Argentine International But we honestly didn't think we would be transferred, because we saw Europe as something very distant." "José Sanfilippo Argentine International In the Americas, we were the best." "Brazil and Uruguay had already played in World Cups in 1950 and 1954, so the whole of Argentina, not only players, but officials and the people of Argentina, thought we were already champions of the world." "It wasn't the same thing as playing against South Americans." "The Europeans, with simple, clumsy football, beat us easily." "Why?" "Because we didn't know how to mark." "We were good with the ball, but none of us talked about marking, or playing one-touch." "No!" "If you gave us the ball, we had to show everything we could do with it." "From that moment, Argentine football suffered a cultural attack." "Cesar Luis Menotti Former Argentina Coach They started to say that to win, you had to prepare yourself physically." "But instead of integrating that with the creativity, talent and imagination of Argentine football, the teams were transformed into teams of aggressive fighters." "It became impossible to beat anybody, because it wasn't our style." "We played Real Madrid in the Intercontinental Championship." "Alberto Spencer Peñarol Here in Montevideo we drew 0-0, in Madrid we lost 5-1." "20 minutes into the game in Madrid, we were losing 4-0." "The Europeans think themselves better than the Latins." "Pelé Santos The great dispute between Latin teams and European teams creates a great rivalry, because the Latins think their football has more technique and is more open, while the Europeans think that their football is more organised and stronger." "Peñarol, in 1960, had just started a period of rebuilding." "That's why, in 1966, this rebuilding paid off." "We met Madrid again, and this time we took our revenge." "The bad atmosphere surrounding that match was caused by an Italian journalist." "Fernando Riera Former Chile Coach He must have been a bit stupid, as the Italian team were all here." "But he said "The women over here are all whores."" "Leonel Sanchez Chilean International We told them with anger "You Argentines have sold yourselves."" ""You should be playing with Argentina in Rancagua, not here with another national team."" "I played for Italy, and I defended the Italian shirt with all my might." "I got a punch on my nose just because I was Argentine and playing for Italy - that's the way they understood it, the Chileans." "What a coincidence, that an Englishman refereed the Germany-Uruguay match." "Antonio Rattin Argentine International Uruguay had three or four players sent off as well." "And look!" "A German refereed the Argentina-England game." "It was all prepared beforehand that we couldn't go through." "I showed him my captain's armband, and he said "Out, out, out!"" "And he sent me off." "How did he understand what I was saying?" "He spoke German, and I spoke Spanish." "He's a liar." "He died a long time ago - may God keep him in glory up there!" "But tell God not to let him come down to referee any more games!" "Juan Veron Estudiantes We know that we wrote an important page in the history of South American football, here at Estudiantes." "It was a beautiful page for all small teams." "It even got to the stage that they were sending women to the opposition's training camp - it was constant gamesmanship." "They even studied the private lives of their rivals to wind them up on the pitch." "Gianni Rivera Milan We were already on the pitch when the Argentine players came on." "They were all carrying a ball." "As soon as they got close." "they all kicked the balls hard against us, to show us how the rest of the match would be." "That match should be eradicated from the history of football, because it was anything but a football match." "It was a manhunt from start to finish." "Carlos Caszely Chilean International We were in camp, and at about midnight the president, Pancho Fruksan, turned up to tell us that the Soviet Union would not play, and that we had qualified." "We still had to turn up, which I considered absurd, start the game, and score a goal." "It was a symbolic thing." "They didn't come because they said they couldn't travel to a country under a dictatorship, and where the national stadium had been a concentration camp." "When the military government took office in March," "Juan Alemann Former Argentine Finance Minister there was a consensus in favour of the military, because Argentina was in a chaotic and ungovernable situation." "It was the case of "The Disappeared"." "In reality they were dead." "What happened was that the military didn't follow the normal methods of a quick judicial process - they simply disappeared." "There was no ceasefire." "The military had effectively disarmed the subversive terrorists, quite simply by killing them." "A training ground is where artisans prepare to create the great personalities in a game of football." "With the will to be efficient, yes, because you compete to win." "But it has to be from an aesthetic point of view and more linked to the sentiments of the people. otherwise it doesn't interest me." "I cried a lot when he left me out, but Flaco Menotti didn't make a mistake, because he won the World Cup." "You can't criticise that." "We were aware that there was something strange going on, even in the first game " "Roberto Rivelino Brazilian International the way things were being done." "And then Peru inexplicably lost the game when they were playing so well." "It is something I consider to be very strange." "In all, it was a World Cup that doesn't make much sense to me." "I think it's disgraceful that somebody can say that a professional footballer in a World Cup is capable of doing that type of thing." "I find it simply cruel." "Mario Kempes Argentine International Holland had their chances, but we were more decisive when the time came to scoring." "When we got to the 14th minute, that psychologically important moment just before the break, there was another move up the left flank." "The rebound, the excitement..." "The whole country was willing me to score that goal." "In Europe, it was said "If you have one Argentine, you have a great team."" ""lf you have two Argentines, you have half a team."" ""lf you have three Argentines, you don't have a team" - as if to say that we couldn't play as a team." "The people had a great need to show the world that we really had very good players, and that we were at the highest competitive level in the world." "It was his first own goal." "Santiago Escobar Brother of Andres Escobar Unfortunately, their behaviour was savage, and that drove them to murder my brother." "I think they were the only people capable of doing that, because Andres was loved by the whole country." "Just for a bet that was made at the World Cup in America," "Andres lost his life." "It was rough on the streets." "At that time in Colombia," "Francisco Maturana Formaer Columbian Coach the situation was that someone would say something, there'd be a reaction, and before you knew it, a fight would end in a gunshot." "Not only the death of Andres Escobar, but all deaths are bad." "Rene Higuita Columbian International There are nice deaths, like when you are asleep in bed, but when they kill you in that way, nobody deserves that - and even more so a person as special as Andres was." "The ticket receipts here for our professional games were $5,000." "Alfonso Senior Former Millonarios President That was for the good gates at the time - not only in Bogotà, but in Cali, Medellin, and even Barranquilla." "The gate receipts weren't great." "I presented Pedernera so that he could salute the crowd, not as a player, but as a future player." "That day, for the presentation of Pedernera," "I received $35,000 in gate receipts." ""The Ballet in Blue." It meant we were dressed in blue, with white shorts and blue socks." "It was if we were dancers in the theatre." "It was a great team." "When the state does not act there is a vacuum, and this vacuum existed." "Willington Ortiz Columbian International It's undeniable." "So the money from the drugs trade found its way into this vacuum, and ended up controlling this vacuum." "So money came into football, and that helped football develop better." "To be honest, since I have been in football," "I haven't known the cartels to be involved in the teams I have played in." "Colombia, champions of America!" "Colombia, champions of America!" "National, champions of America!" "Colombia, champions of America!" "Colombia, champions of America!" "Colombia, continental champions!" "Colombia, continental champions!" "My country!" "My beloved country!" "Hernan Palaez Restrepo Journalist, Columbia Everyone, even Pelé, was willing to say that Colombia would challenge for the World Cup." "The people heard this, and they became convinced that we would be world champions." "Faustino Asprilla Columbian International They were going to kill Maturana, the family of his assistant, and a player, so there were lots of threats." "That was where our dream ended, because with all the threats and everything that happened, we stopped thinking about football." "We were thinking about our wellbeing and our families." "In the middle is a nation of people who don't know where to turn, and don't know where the next bullet is coming from." "But they believe in their country and feel that this situation will improve, because this country deserves a better life than it is living." "Francisco Sa Argentine International I think that the source of Argentine football has no limits, because even if you sell them, more still come through." "So it's not a problem for us." "Mexico participate in their local championship," "Antonio Carbajal Mexican International in the Confederations Cup, in the North American Cup, and in the Merconorte, and in the Libertadores," "And what happens?" "There isn't the capability to achieve our goals." "He who takes on a lot, grasps little." "Hugo Sanchez Mexican International I prefer quality to quantity." "I would prefer it if Mexico didn't go to World Cups, because we don't deserve it." "If we deserve it, by competing against the best, we will improve." "With more competition, we will have higher standards." "We've made no impact at world level because we haven't had that competition." "We had the enormous luck to encounter a Maradona from another planet, a Maradona at the peak of his football career." "At that time, Diego was capable of transforming to greatness any team." "I had already tried so hard in 1982." "I dreamt of lifting that cup, and it didn't happen." "1986 was my big opportunity." "They were very calm." "They said to me "We are going to win, no problem."" "There was a great serenity and confidence in the team at that moment." "It's like touching the sky with your hands." "It's hard for me to define it." "Sometimes there are good games and sometimes not so good - but there are no bad games." "Football is great fun." "Football, I carry it inside me - even today. at 91 years old." "I see the ball and I see that lovely green grass when I'm in the stadium, and I still get that urge - it's so beautiful!" "ENGLISH"