The Argentine Presidency’s ‘forgetting’ of the figure of Diego Armando Maradona By mentioning some of the South American country’s leading figures on International Left-Handed Players’ Day, which is celebrated this Tuesday, he has sparked a strong controversy in Argentina. The spokesman for the Argentine Presidency, Manuel Adorni, closed his usual press conference at the Casa Rosada (headquarters of the Executive) by greeting “Lionel Messi, Ángel di María, Emanuel Ginóbili, Sergio ‘Maravilla’ Martínez and Guillermo Vilas”, as well as “great Argentine musicians such as Gustavo Cerati or Charly García”.
And he added, making a play on words with the ideological left-wing (left-wing politics) to which the Argentine president, Javier Milei, and the libertarian environment usually refer: “Great left-wingers who in these cases did contribute to the greatness of Argentina.”
The journalists present in the press room pointed out that he had forgotten another illustrious left-footed Argentine, none other than the former footballer and former coach of the Albiceleste, world champion in 1986, so he had to add: “Who? Oh, yes, he was left-footed.”
The reactions were not long in coming and, shortly after, Maradona’s official Instagram account, managed by his heirs, published a harsh post addressed to Adorni: “The left-hander you forgot is the idol of all those you named… Happy day to all those who, on a daily basis, overcome the difficulties of a world designed only for right-handed people.”
His daughter Dalma called Adorni a ‘muppet’ and stated on her social media that “he is someone’s spokesperson, he cannot say what he thinks.” Meanwhile, the official account of Gimnasia y Esgrima de La Plata, the team that Maradona was coaching when he died on November 25, 2020, shared a photograph of ‘El Diego’ and wrote “Immortal left-hander” next to a blue heart.
‘Black Enrique’, one of the toughest
One of the harshest messages was from the 1986 world champion, Héctor Adolfo Enrique, who posted a video on social media in which he criticized Adorni. “I received a video of this kid: Adorni; who is the world champion of idiots and thinks he’s smart. Thank God, you didn’t name the greatest of all: Diego. So, Adorni: there are the idiots, the very idiots and you,” said ‘Negro Enrique’.
Another figure from the world of football, the former footballer and current president of Estudiantes de La Plata, Juan Sebastián Verón, highlighted in an Instagram story: “You may agree or not with everything that happened off the field, but you cannot ignore the person who made a country happy. Respect.”
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Fernando Signorini, who was the personal physical trainer of ‘Pelusa’ in the World Cups in Mexico 1986, Italy 1990 and the United States 1994, also spoke out severely when he published on his X account: “You will be forgotten on the way from the wake to the cemetery.”
Maradona was always close to Peronism, the ideological line that governed Argentina for 16 of the last 20 years and which is now in opposition following the rise to the Presidency of Milei, a great football fan who considers Lionel Messi to be the best Argentine player in history.
