Lionel Messi’s tribute to his fellow Argentinian was strangely moving, an acknowledgement of a debt owed to the previous generation of players
It’s a tribute, but there’s more to it than that. It’s a shirt, but there’s more to it than that, too. For a fleeting moment, as
Lionel Messi stands at the Camp Nou in 2020 wearing the No 10 jersey that Diego Maradona wore for Newell’s Old Boys in 1993, past and present are aligned. Messi isn’t just paying homage to Maradona; in that moment he is Maradona, two as one. Then, as if re-entering the earthly plane, he slips his
Barcelona jersey back on and dutifully collects his yellow card.
So yes, here we are: another paean to Maradona, this time – usefully! – from someone who never actually saw him play. I have a few vague, pointless memories of the 1994
World Cup, a tournament at which I later learned Maradona was not – pharmaceutically speaking – at his purest vintage. But this isn’t a personal history, or any sort of history, or really very much about Maradona at all. It’s about
Football now; about magic and where you find it; about joy, and how you pass it on.