The Brazilian Edson Arantes do Nascimento ‘Pelé’ and Diego Armando Maradonatwo of the greatest in the history of football, if not the greatest, met on April 9, 1979 on a secret date in Rio de Janeiro that was arranged at the express wish of the then player of Argentinos Juniors.
They were not contemporaries because Pele, died in 2022it took him 20 years Maradona, who died in 2020; and they were only active between 1976 and 1977, since the Argentine was not born when the Brazilian won in Sweden in 1958 and was ten years old when he won his third World Cup in Mexico in 1970.
Diego Armando Maradonhad been left out of the call for César Luis Menotti for Argentina 1978 despite being on the previous list of 25 and, according to the coach, he did it “because he was thinking about ’79”, the Youth World Cup in Japan that he ended up winning. Argentina and “it was very young and had very experienced people like Kempes and Villa.”
The year after his country’s World Cup, Maradona turns to one of the main editors of the newspaper ‘The graphic‘and your friend, William Whiteto make your dream of meeting Pelewhich was not easy because you had to pull a lot of strings and travel to Rio to be with ‘O Rei’ without anyone finding out and without interfering in your commitments with Argentinos Juniors.
Pelenow retired, had just participated in a tribute to his compatriot Zico and Maradonato play a Huracán-Argentinos Juniors. After the game, White and Maradona They left on a flight to the Ezeiza airport, where their father was waiting for them. Maradona; the photographer Ricardo Alfierifriend of Pele; and his manager at the time, the deceased Jorge Cyterszpiler.
They all settled in the Palace Hotel, in Copacabana. The journalists in a double room and Maradona and his team in a triple, while the Brazilian, meanwhile, waited for them at the billionaire’s mansion Alfredo Saadwhere he stayed when he traveled to Rio de Janeiro.
Half secrecy
The secrecy of the meeting was not entirely secret, since the president of Argentino Juniors, Prospero Consolimet him and tried to prevent his player from taking a plane to Rio, although his joining the Albiceleste days later was used as a safe passage for him to travel to Brazil so that no one would be bothered.
‘O Rei’ advised his heir to the football throne and told him to “never” pay attention “when they tell you that you are the best”, since “the day you feel the best you will stop being the best” and “the physical It is your work tool.”
The magnetism of the talk paralyzed a photographer as veteran as Alfierias revealed William White years later, when Maradona He had been crowned in the Youth World Cup in Japan after being the top scorer in the ’79 Clausura Tournament.
A friendship relationship that was not such
Pele He gave him his watch, a T-shirt Brazilsigned a ball for him and gave him the medal that had been given to him at his farewell at the New York Cosmosalthough the friendship that the meeting predicted was not such as the years went by.
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However, despite their differences, in their last public appearances the friendship was rekindled and in 2005, in ‘The Night of the Ten‘, cycle that led Maradona for Channel Thirteen, Pele accepted his invitation to go to the program that broke audience records.
