June 25, 1994.
A golden era ended when Diego
Maradona was led down the tunnel in Foxboro
Stadium to take a random drugs test that would
smash his international career into pieces. The
little No. 10 was never seen again in the
Albiceleste shirt, leaving his nation to begin the
impossible task of finding a replacement.
Lionel Messi has now also drawn a curtain on life
with the most demanding national team on the
planet. His journey ends, like Diego's, in that most
incongruous of football backdrops, the United
States, just days past his 29th birthday. The
Barcelona star came closer than anyone to finally
putting the Ghost of Diego to bed once and for
all, but despite four finals, he ultimately failed.
There were no recriminations in the bowels of New
theories, no scores to settle, no easy headlines
to please lazy newspaper hacks. A repeat of
Maradona's "my legs were cut off" laments was
never likely to occur. Just the recognition that,
having failed to break a trophy drought that
spans five finals and 23 years, he had no more
left to give in his quest to match El Pibe de Oro.
"The national team is finished for me, that's it," he
told reporters in the mixed zone, and with those
few words pulled the curtain down on an
international career that, if compared to anyone
apart from a demigod like Diego, would be the
source of infinite pride and honour.
Messi, however, will always see an asterisk next
to his name when his Argentina record comes up.
He may be the nation's highest-ever scorer,
having unseated Gabriel Batistuta against the
United States to move on to 55 strikes. He may
have lit up the country with some unforgettable
performances. But he is not Diego, and the nation
has never lacked those who were more than willing to point that fact out.
Diego delivered a World Cup, and Messi did not.
That is the simple fact that will live with him
until the end of his career, unless he can
somehow be talked into a return ahead of Russia
2018. But this is also a victory for the most
cynical, manipulative elements of the Argentine
press, who refused to analyse Messi's
achievements without first putting them up against the man known simply as D10s (God). It was an impossible challenge.
Argentina have been searching for a new Maradona
for the last 22 years. It is a peculiar national
sickness. In Brazil, after all, secure in the
knowledge no team can match their five World
Cups, nobody demands Neymar, or Rivaldo, Ronaldo,
Romario or Zico before them, be the living
reincarnation of Pele. Mario Gomez does not buckle
under the strain of matching Gerd Muller's Germany
exploits, and when Cristiano Ronaldo takes the
field for Portugal he does so as Cristiano Ronaldo
the Real Madrid scorer, not a 21st century version
of Eusebio.
But the Albiceleste cannot let go of the legend of
1986, as the wall-to-wall coverage in Buenos Aires
of the Mexico World Cup's 30th anniversary acutely demonstrates. And the pressure to live up to the man whose name is still synonymous with the No.10 has sank more than one career.
Ariel Ortega was the first man to try, literally in
his case as he replaced Diego in the United
States at the outset of his career. El Burrito had
the wayward temperament of the Napoli legend, but could not channel it into the commanding
performances Argentina demands of its playmakers.
Alcohol, indiscipline on and off the field and a
marked decline later on meant that, even with
more than 80 caps, he fell well short of that mark.
Another iconic '10', Juan Roman Riquelme, suffered
the double nightmare of trying to live up to the
great man's legacy while being coached by him
from the sidelines for part of his international
career. The ex-Barcelona, Villarreal and Boca
Juniors man had a brilliant career, but it could
never live up to the man he replaced in the
Bombonera for his final ever professional
appearance back in 1997.
Marcelo Gallardo, Pablo Aimar, Carlos Tevez and
Andres D'Alessandro were also saddled with the
mantle of the New Maradona as they took their
first steps in football. While each of those players
has enjoyed a career packed with success, not one
has been able to fill the shadow left by their
predecessor. And the less said about Carlos
Marinelli and Franco Di Santo, two other failed
candidates, perhaps the better.
Messi appeared to be the only man capable of
filling those shoes. But even with a virtuoso Copa
America, the Barcelona star was destined to fall
short once again, as if he felt the weight of that
impossible comparison pressing on his shoulders.
"Win the Copa America, or do not come home,"
Diego had told his compatriots from Buenos Aires
in the run-up to the final. As Messi watched his
penalty soar over the crossbar of Claudio Bravo
those words must have come rushing back to his
head. His tears as Chile celebrated their second
Copa title in as many years were not just the
tears of a man who has tasted defeat.
They were the tears of a defeated man, a man
who has given everything he has only to see that
it was not enough. The undoubted truth of a
statement, oft-repeated in these days, that if the
likes of Gonzalo Higuain and Rodrigo Palacio had
taken their chances as Jorge Burruchaga and
Jorge Valdano did in 1986 Messi would now be a
hero, is no consolation.
"Diego Armando Maradona was adored not only for his prodigious talent, but also because he was a dirty god, a sinner, the most human of the gods,"
the late Eduardo Galeano wrote of the Argentine
legend.
"Anyone could see in him a living synthesis of
human weakness, or at the very least male
weakness: adulterer, drunk, cheater, liar, braggart,
irresponsible. But the gods do not just fade away,
as human as they may be." Perhaps that too
explains why the best player on the planet could
never live up to the example set by Diego. The
1986 World Cup winner's all-too evident human
failings were compensated by his incredible
bravery and skill on the field, while Messi, clean-
cut and barely perceptible off the field, was just
too perfect for the Argentine public to take him
to their hearts.
Messi will still come home to Argentina, but it will
no longer be his footballing home. Barcelona now
becomes the centre of his sporting universe, the
city where he is idolised without the painful
addendum of Maradona qualifying his greatness. And
his retirement is a catastrophic loss for the
Albiceleste. The captain put himself through hell
to escape from Diego's shadow; and if he could
not do it, it is unlikely that anyone can.
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