Football is a game in which the cliches invariably are true. It’s a game of two halves, the best team wins, the referee’s a moron and I’m either over the moon or as sick as a parrot.

This was a game of two halves. Racing were superior in the first half, scored one goal and really should have gone in at the break 4-0 up. But they squandered their chances. Argentinos Juniors made some much needed changes at half time, came out with some shape and vigour and scored two goals – the first from the worst player on the pitch, Santiago Salcedo, and the second fifteen minutes from time by Gonzalo Prosperi, who’d had a lousy first half.

The referee booked the Racing player, Teofilo Gutierrez for diving when even the Argentinos Juniors fans accepted that it should have been a penalty and he sent off Franco Zuculini for a second yellow card to leave Racing with ten men, their fans as sick as the proverbial parrots and me over the moon.

Over the Moon!

This victory moves Argentinos Juniors up to a remarkable fourth place, just three points behind the leaders, Velez. Remarkable simply because they’ve not been playing very well but have hung in there with grit and determination and a small dose of good luck.

Racing are a huge club with massive and vociferous support who promise much and usually fail to deliver – sometimes in spectacular circumstances. To my mind they’re the Argentine Manchester City. They’ve even got the same colours. This was only one game but it was a game there for the taking and through a mixture of nerves, incompetence and bad luck, they didn’t take it.

Argentinos Juniors were sluggish and out of sorts, probably as a result of being dumped out of the Copa Libertadores on Wednesday night by Fluminense of Brazil.

Argentinos had been sitting pretty in their group after kicking off with two wins and a draw in a tough group that also included Nacional of Uruguay and America from Mexico. But they then lost their final three games when all they probably needed was a draw to progress into the next round.

The Wednesday night game had it all. There was a penalty for each side, the ball smacked against the woodwork, there was passion, tension and when the final whistle went, with Fluminense 4-2 winners, an almighty punch-up. Argentinos players chased the Brazilians around the pitch, riot police stepped in, fists were flailing, boots were flying. It looked at times like something out of an old Keystones Cops movie.

The papers the next day talked of national shame which I thought was a bit strong. To me it looked like a bit of hot-headed Argy-Bargy in the heat and frustration of the moment. No long-term harm done.

The football’s not been providing me with much succour these days, what with the Fluminense debacle and West Ham’s 3-0 drubbing at the hands of Chelsea. So I’ve been going to the cinema where at least you can do a bit of research beforehand about the kind of result you’re likely to get.

The unexpected though comes from the cinema audience. I saw the excellent ‘Revolution’ – an epic Argentine film about the liberator from Spanish rule, Jose de San Martin.

He’s famous for many things and his statue adorns pretty much every plaza in Argentina and many in Chile. However, perhaps his most dramatic act was taking an army across the Andes mountains to defeat the Spanish troops in the Battle of Chacabuco.

At the football, you expect those around you to talk and shout, rustle paper, send text messages on the latest scores, jump and fart and generally make noise and commotion. If they didn’t, it’d be like watching Chelsea.

But we shouldn’t be expected to tolerate that kind of behaviour from middle-aged women sitting behind me in the cinema. I stood up as the credits rolled to castigate them with the words: “San Martin didn’t march through the Andes to create a country which breeds people who talk in the cinema.”

Over the Andes.

A bit over the top, I agree. I’m also aware that there was no cinema in 1817. They looked at me as though I were the weirdo for protesting.

One of the points of the film was that sometimes we have to attempt the difficult and unexpected, then overcome huge odds to achieve great things. Another was to choose your seat carefully and avoid groups of middle-aged women with horn-rimmed spectacles who have gone to the cinema on a Saturday night for a good natter.

After liberating huge tracts of South America from the Spaniards, San Martin then went into voluntary exile, ending his days in Boulogne-sur-Mer on the north coast of France. Yes! That Boulogne. The place many of us English school kids went to on our first trip abroad – a day-trip on a vomit bedecked ferry when on the way back Katy Higgins would snog anyone prepared to cough up 20p. I’d spent mine on a Boulogne sticker so missed out.

San Martin upped and left after a meeting in Guayaquil, in what is now Ecuador, with the other great liberator, the one who freed the northern parts, Simon Bolivar. What they spoke about and what agreements or agreements to disagree they arrived at, we don’t know. It’s one of the great mysteries of South American history.

A lesser mystery is what happened in the Argentine first division this weekend. Nearly all the teams expected to win, lost. Top team Velez, went down 3-2 at home to lowly Quilmes. Title contenders Estudiantes lost 2-0 at home to Colon. River, also with championship hopes, were defeated by modest Godoy Cruz and San Lorenzo lost 1-0 to Tigre. Boca Juniors, who’ve not been able to get anything right this season, beat Huracan 3-0 with Martin Palermo ending his goal drought.

Newell’s remain rooted to the foot of the table after losing 1-0 to Banfield and Independiente and All Boys drew 2-2 while Arsenal and Gimnasia tied at 1-1.

He was also the man who helped to negotiate state television taking over the broadcast of all live first division games. That meant free footy for the fans and an end to expensive satellite dishes or having to watch your team at a nearby bar where you’d make one beer last for the full ninety-minutes.

Oh! And he was also the former president of Argentina, the husband of the current president and the man likely to be the next president, after elections next year.

Too Much!

What he was not was a healthy man. Nestor Kirchner had deep, sunken eyes surrounded by shadows darker than those cast by the clouds over Upton Park. His hair was lank and his suits ill-fitting.

He’d already been taken to hospital twice this year with heart problems. He went under the knife in February shortly after Racing had kicked off against Arsenal. When he came to, he asked what the score was and, it was reported, his wife and the medical team lied to him in order to help his recovery. Racing had lost 4-2.

He was back in hospital in September when he was given heart by-pass surgery. Forty-eight hours after being sewn up he was back on his feet, alongside his wife, Cristina, at a political rally. His doctors have every right to now say: “I told you so.”

He was that rare creature in modern-day politics who didn’t seem to care about his image. There was none of that jogging around the presidential garden with his body-guards for the TV cameras nor coaching from image consultants. He was however totally at ease munching on a fatty Choripan while negotiating with union leaders over beer in smoke-filled rooms.

He was a crappy speaker, doing nothing to hide a slight speech impediment. And charisma he probably thought was a new defender signed from Paraguay during the close season. Pablo Charisma, hard tackler and a useful left foot. Kirchner was a backroom operator, a wheeler-dealer, a man who forged alliances and made deals. Whether you agreed with him or not, he knew what he wanted out of politics and how to get it.

He’s been credited with overseeing Argentina’s return to relative stability and prosperity following its economic and social crisis at the end of 2001. He stood up to the International Monetary Fund, which many Argentines blamed for that crisis. And he ensured that the prosecutions were resumed of those responsible for human rights violations under military rule in the nineteen seventies and eighties.

Some accused him of corruption, others said he was a man who bore grudges. His move to put football on state television was driven by his dispute with the media group that had previously owned the rights.

But the national show of sorrow and mourning was immense and genuine, I suspect because, love him or hate him, he was genuine.

His love of football was certainly real, not something added on by his advisors to improve his standing among the working classes.  If it were, they’d have insisted he support Boca Juniors or River Plate rather than perennial losers, Racing.

Nestor Kirchner

Racing, based in the industrial suburb of Avellaneda just south of Buenos Aires, really should be much better. Their stadium is right next to their local rivals, Independiente.  Both are big clubs with a huge number of fans. But while Independiente have a trophy cabinet bulging with silverware from both national and international competitions, Racing’s displays large gaps with the words ‘unfulfilled potential’ written in the dust.

The team’s ability to sustain their optimism in the face of cock-up after cock-up is admirable. They remind me of Newcastle United or Manchester City, before they became a rich man’s toy. This ability to consistently disappoint can have done nothing to help a man suffering from stress.

The outpouring of grief for Nestor Kirchner’s passing has been impressive, with some waiting twenty hours to pay their last respects to his closed coffin, laid in the presidential palace in Buenos Aires. Presidents flew in from across South America.

Diego Maradona came. Nestor Kirchner was his strongest ally in his bid to retake the reins of the national team. It probably wouldn’t have been enough but with Nestor’s passing, I suspect the little fat fellow has lost any faint hope he might have had of fulfilling his dream.

The crowds were out again on Friday, in the rain, causing several hours delay in moving Kirchner’s body to the city airport. From there it was flown to his home town, Rio Gallegos, deep down in Patagonia, where it was laid to rest in the local cemetery, I suspect accompanied by a blue and white Racing Club scarf.

There’s been a pattern to Argentinos Juniors’ play this season. They tend to dominate the first half with some neat passing from midfield. Their defence is solid but their attack is woeful. They’ll take the lead but then can’t use their dominance to finish the game off and gradually their opponents get more and more into the game until the equaliser, followed swiftly by a scrappy winner, becomes inevitable.

Such was the case today. This was my first visit to the Racing ground which somehow manages to be both huge and intimate. It’s got plenty of echo and the travelling support, with a consistent drum contingent, was ear-splittingly noisy.

Ear-splittingly Noisy

Franco Niell put Argentinos ahead in the first half. Racing were simply not very good and Argentinos should have made them pay. Perhaps they’re just too nice. The Colombian Giovanni Moreno played a blinder and his equaliser, from a free kick, was sublime, just sneaking over the wall and into the top left-hand corner. Nicolas Navarro had no chance.

There wasn’t much he could do about the second either, also scored by Moreno. But one of the best moments of the game was the save he made near the end. I was right behind the goal so had a perfect view and was sure the ball was about to hit the back of the net when Navarro leapt across the face of the goal and pushed it away.

He’s a fine keeper and exudes confidence in his defence.  Although some fans have questioned why the manager brought him in at the start of the season when they already had a perfectly good stopper in the young Luis Ojeda, who more than earned a permanent place in the run-in to winning the championship. The money, they argue, would have been better spent on a ruthless front man.

Argentina has always been blessed with talented and interesting goalkeepers.

At the top of the list is Ubaldo Fillol, nicknamed The Duck, who played in the 1978 World Cup winning team and in the less- memorable 1982 campaign. He also had two stints at Racing and played 17 games for Argentinos Juniors in 1983.

Racing Club - Huge yet Intimate

The current number one Number One, Sergio Romero, playing in Holland, I believe is a worthy successor.

One of the more colourful characters in the Argentine game in recent years was the Paraguayan keeper, Jose Luis Chilavert, who helped Velez Sarsfield to a hatful of titles and the Copa Libertadores in the nineties.

He was a restless goalkeeper, often straying up to the half-way line and was a useful penalty taker, scoring sixty-two goals in his career, including three in one match in the Argentine league against Ferrocarril Oeste. He also played in Spain, France and Uruguay and was last in the news when he announced he would consider standing as president in future elections in Paraguay.

The darkest and most sinister of Argentine goalkeepers was Edgardo ‘The Cat’ Andrada who played for Rosario Central and Colon in Argentina and Vasco in Brazil. He’ll go into the record books as the keeper who let in Pele’s 1,000th goal, from a penalty, in a game between Vasco and Santos.

They say that goalkeepers, like drummers, are weird and Andrada would appear to fit that bill. He’s being investigated after a major figure from the dictatorship that terrorised Argentina during the nineteen-seventies and eighties said the keeper was part of a gang that kidnapped and tortured opponents of the regime.

Andrada - Just a Goalkeeper?

He’s been accused of being an intelligence agent for the military government and of involvement in the kidnap and murder of two political activists, Osvaldo Cambiaso y Eduardo Pereira Rossi. Andrada, not surprisingly, denies everything. “I was just a goalkeeper,” he says.

On the receiving end of those dark years of military terror known as ‘The Dirty War’ was another goalkeeper, Claudio Tamburrini who played for the second division outfit, Almagro. He was kidnapped in November 1977 by agents working for the air force and taken to a detention centre. He was involved in student politics but was probably picked up since another student, under torture, gave up his name, any name, simply to stop them hurting him. Tamburrini was held there for four months, strapped naked to a bed and subjected to regular torture until, with three fellow inmates, he managed to escape.

He made it into exile in Sweden where he still lives, as a writer and philosopher. He wrote a book about his ordeal and escape called Free Pass – Chronicle of an Escape. I interviewed him in Buenos Aires a few years ago when he was here to promote the release of the film based on the book.

The film is excellent, starting with powerful images of the four fleeing prisoners running naked along a deserted road in the early hours of the morning. He has a good life now as a well-respected academic and writer – some reward for an ordeal that continues to haunt the individuals it terrorised as well as the nation that produced it.

Like all the survivors of the Dirty War that I’ve interviewed, Tamburrini exuded a calmness, a quiet determination to overcome his nightmare and understand how the torturers could have done what they did to fellow human beings.

British poet Simon Armitage has written about goalkeepers in verse and prose and said this in The Guardian after the blunder by England’s Robert Green in the game against the US at the 2010 World Cup: “Goalkeepers are, by definition, weirdos and odd ones out: they put their faces where others put their studs, and their chosen function in a sport defined by its flow and energy is one of apparent inaction followed by occasional moments of joy-killing intervention.”

The front page news on Monday morning was simply that Boca Juniors won a game…2-0 at home to Huracan with that old war-horse, Martin Palermo, scoring the first. River Plate could only manage a 2-2 draw at Godoy Cruz. Estudiantes stay top after a 1-1 result against Colon while Velez keep up the pressure, just three points behind, after beating bottom club, Quilmes, 2-0. Arsenal are equal second after beating Gimnasia 3-2. Argentinos play All Boys next Saturday. They beat Independiente 3-1. San Lorenzo 2 Tigre 0; Olimpo 1 Lanus 0 and Banfield 0 Newell’s 0.

I’m not going to say it since when I said it last season after Argentinos Juniors strung a few victories together, they went on to lose and draw their next batch of games. But three wins on the trot and….no! Resist! Resist!

And the winner is....

It’s a week now since the Oscars were handed out but the glitz is still glittering here in Argentina and no-one wants to roll up their red carpets. For an Argentine film, El Secreto de sus Ojos or The Secret In Their Eyes won the best foreign film award. That’s the one they present between the Oscar for Most Comfy Director’s Chair and Best Sandwiches Sold on Set.

Basically, very few people outside of the countries concerned give a toss. Least of all the film critics. Here are a couple of quotes from critics of that reputable British newspaper, The Guardian. These are people paid to do nothing more than sit in a darkened room eating popcorn and commenting on the films they see. I always used to wonder why actors and directors were so disparaging about film critics, talking about them in the same way the rest of us discuss estate agents and football referees. Now I know.

The first nominee out of the envelope is the Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw who wrote: “I must now confess that I have not yet seen Juan José Campanella’s The Secret of Their Eyes – it is much liked and admired, but I can’t help feeling that this is a real banana-skin moment. It puts me in mind of Ronald Bergan’s online discussion of how, in the history of world cinema, the Oscar for the best foreign language film is traditionally given to the wrong film.”

His colleague, Xan Brooks, informs us: “OK, so I have yet to see The Secret in Her Eyes and maybe it’s brilliant. Until then, this result strikes me as more than a little perverse.”

Have they no shame? They don’t make films, they don’t write films and they don’t even watch the films they criticise. In what other job can you do that? “I didn’t see the game since I was painting the bathroom at the time. But I thought the United midfield was crap and the referee, when will he get his eyes tested? In my informed opinion, City are dead certs for the title but I’ll let you know more when I finally get to see them play.”

OK, you may say, it’s only the foreign language film. But what First World arrogance! Neither even bothered to get the English translation of the title right. Would they treat a US or a British film with such lazy contempt?

Now that I’ve got that off my chest I can tell you that I have seen the film. Pretty much everyone in Argentina has and those who haven’t will be queuing up outside their nearest cinema as we speak.

It’s a very good rather than a great movie. I’ve not seen the other Oscar nominees so I wouldn’t dare to hazard an opinion on whether it was the best of the batch in the foreign language section.

Film Star - the Huracan stadium

It’s a thriller, a murder hunt set in both the nineteen-seventies during Argentina’s military dictatorship and in the present day. It beautifully evokes both eras, is wonderfully acted and football plays a key role in the story.

That’s no surprise when you consider that the Oscar winning director, Juan José Campanella is a River Plate fan and the original story writer and script editor, Eduardo Sacheri, follows Independiente.

But it’s Racing Club, Independiente’s rivals, which have the starring role and Sacheri admits that he found it uncomfortable to have to talk to their fans during the course of his research.

An obsession with football plays a big part in solving the mystery although I obviously can’t reveal more since I’m recommending that you see the film. There is also a great chase scene set in the Huracan stadium in a supposed game between Huracan and Racing.

http://www.ole.clarin.com/notas/2010/03/08/informaciongeneral/02154969.html

“And the Oscar for Best Football Stadium….wait for it…goes to Huracan’s Tomás Adolfo Ducó stadium in The Secret In Their Eyes.”

The other element which stuck in my mind long after I left the cinema was the way Campanella illustrated how dictatorships encourage the pathetic little people to emerge and rise to positions of prominence. Once there, they’re able to wreak their revenge on a society they feel has slighted them. We all know who they are. How many assistant tax inspectors, estate agents and film critics rose to positions of prominence in Germany’s Nazi Party? Slugs, who in normal society would have been ignored or treated with the contempt they deserved, revelled in and abused their authority. The Secret In Their Eyes shows the same kind of people thriving in an Argentine system that was rotten to the core.

Campanella - River Plate fan

Argentina has only ever won the Oscar once before, in 1985 for The Official Story, again about the military dictatorship that terrorised the country between 1976 and 1983. These winners are an important advert for the Argentine film industry and for the country itself since most foreigners might never see another film from this part of the world.

Argentina simply doesn’t have the money to make many films but it nonetheless has an enthusiastic and knowledgeable cinema-going public and a small but talented movie industry. The same few actors tend to crop up in almost every production because the money-men can’t afford to gamble on the untried and the un-trusted – so you can bet the price of a bag of popcorn that if Ricardo Darin isn’t in the Argentine film you’re about to watch, then Gaston Pauls will be.

There’s a neighbourhood of Buenos Aires that’s been dubbed Palermo Hollywood simply because so many film directors and students from across Latin America have congregated there to discuss the finer points of Buñuel and Bergman…and to make the odd film.

Of course, Hollywood dominates like it does in much of the rest of the world. But the cinemas in Buenos Aires are generally packed, especially for the weekend late-night screenings.

This game didn’t deserve much in the way of prizes, not even a nomination. The only drama came late in the second half. Nicholas Pavlovich scored the winner after a neat move by the visitors. Racing then managed to fluff a penalty which would have given them an ill-deserved draw. It was still more entertaining than an Oscar acceptance speech and the good guys won in the end.

I’m going to ramble only semi-coherently in relation to this game since it pains me to be direct. The Argentinos Juniors’ front man,  Nicolas Pavlovich is nicknamed El Buitre or the vulture because he’s a ruthless predator who devours any loose ball and callously slots it into the net. But after this game he should perhaps be renamed ‘The Pampered Budgie’ or ‘Mimi the Poodle.’

Hungry for goal

A wounded herd of antelope lay invitingly in the Godoy Cruz penalty area, with assorted vegetables available, but instead of sinking their talons into the tender flesh, ‘The Vulture’ and his teammates pondered the menu, inquiring over the vegetarian option. As the home side nibbled on crudities, Godoy Cruz stole into their nests, ate their children and stole their electrical appliances.

By the time Santiago Gentiletti grabbed one back for Argentinos Juniors it was too late. Godoy Cruz had already scored two and were ready to saunter back to the western city of Mendoza, licking the blood off their lips and chuckling heartily to themselves. This modest little team, which Argentinos Juniors thrashed at their own stadium last season, are unbeaten this year and sit proudly as joint leaders with Colon at the top of the Argentine first division.

This was the first time my kids had seen Argentinos Juniors beaten at home and I could see them losing faith. “Be strong,” I said wisely. “Strength in defeat will make you more of an Argentinos Juniors fan and victory, whenever it comes, will taste even sweeter.”

They looked at me admiringly and replied: “Can we have another Coke and a hotdog.” As a West Ham fan I’ve learnt to deal with defeat. I prepare myself for disappointment and am well aware that football, like life, can turn from being 2-0 up with twenty minutes to go into a 3-2 home defeat in the time it takes to drink half a cup of Bovril.

I have an ill-thought out theory that bears no scientific scrutiny whatsoever that the team you support says something about the kind of person you are.  We could, but we don’t, all support Manchester United, Chelsea, Real Madrid and River Plate. Who are those fans who turn out every week to cheer on Rochdale, Stenhousemuir and Platense? What kind of grit do you have in your souls? And is there a Swiss Army knife blade designed to remove it?

I’m fairly likely to forget your name, will certainly not remember your children’s but I will never forget what football team you support. You might be John the chartered accountant but to me, fundamentally, you’ll always be ‘that bloke with a season ticket at QPR who was at the 1967 League Cup final.”

Why oh why oh why!!!?? Half time misery.

The team you support and what it says about you is vital in Argentina where football seeps, sometimes unexpectedly, into everyday life. And real life very rarely seeps into the football stadium, which is probably one of the main reasons why the game is so popular here.

Argentina is a wonderful country but it should be so much better. They’re celebrating their bicentenary this year. When they marked the first hundred years in 1910, the future looked so bright. Immigrants were pouring in at a steady rate, attracted by the promise of a brave new world. The recently tamed pampas stretched the length of ten-thousand football pitches. There was land and jobs for all. Their railway network was one of the finest in the world. Grand, new European-style buildings lined the boulevards of Buenos Aires.

But a hundred years and several military coups later, spiced up by countless corrupt governments and millions of squandered pesos, the bicentenary is a little less sparkly.

A taxi ride rarely goes by without the driver bemoaning the state of the country, pining nostalgically for the good old days and grumbling about rising crime, the government, the economy and the schools. Since none of them were around in 1910 I’m not sure what golden age they’re referring to. But they’re not happy and football provides some much needed escapism.

There’re a lot of teams to choose from in Buenos Aires so just pick the one that best suits your personality. Boca Juniors if you’re a working class lad made good or with aspirations to make good or with the desire to flaunt real or imagined working class roots. It’s River Plate, the Millionaires, if you were born affluent, or would like to have been, and want the world to know. Racing Club will do for those who really revel in a good whinge since they constantly disappoint and it has to be your local neighbourhood side if you’re a local neighbourhood sort of person.

No-one is quite so calculated about which club they are seen to support as Argentine politicians. The former president and wannabe racing car driver, Carlos Menem, was an avid River Plate fan. Nestor Kirchner, the last president, husband of the current president and widely thought to be the man behind the throne, is a Racing Club man.  Much was made of the fact that as he went under the knife for a recent operation he asked how his team was doing. His wife and the doctors lied since, as usual, Racing had thrown away a lead and they didn’t want to upset Mr Kirchner in his delicate state.

Racing Club fan

The mayor of Buenos Aires, Mauricio Macri, is stinking rich and would look much better in the red and white of River Plate than the blue and gold of Boca Juniors. But it was as president of Boca that he gained national recognition. While he was at the helm, Boca won trophies and balanced their books. Many of the large working population of Buenos Aires thought: “Maybe he’ll run the city as well as he runs the club.” They voted for the kind of man who they’d normally dismiss as just another cocktail sipping, rich man’s son.

As you can probably tell from the tone of this ramble, I’m a little disillusioned with the Red Bugs after two defeats on the trot. It’s Estudiantes away next then Velez at home, two tough games and the team isn’t gelling.

Before all the games this weekend,  there was a minute’s silence for the victims of the Chilean earthquake. Two Argentinos players, the goalkeeper Nicolas Peric and Emilio Hernandez, are Chilean and perhaps, with the uncertainty back home to worry about, they were not fully concentrated on their game. Real life can sometimes, even in Argentina, seep into the football stadium.

With the national team now safely qualified for the World Cup and a two-nil win for Argentinos Juniors on a delightful Southern Hemisphere spring evening, all would seem well in the world of Argentine football. But all is not well – far from it.

The topic of conversation on the terraces was still, three days after the event, Diego Maradona’s diatribe against the press after his team’s 1-0 victory against Uruguay. He must have known. He was at this match, keeping an uncharacteristically low profile.

Reasons to be Cheerful?

Don’t get me wrong. Most Argentines are mightily relieved that their boys, after a disjointed qualifying campaign, will be going to South Africa next year.  The tension during that final qualifying game against Uruguay was almost tangible. Hospitals said they had eighty percent less patients coming in than usual, police in the centre of Buenos Aires reported almost no crime and cinemas either pushed their films to a later slot or shut up shop altogether.

But there was a slow realisation that the face of the nation, the man who will be speaking on their behalf in South Africa thinks there is nothing wrong with urging, in public, his detractors to suck on his private parts – not just once, but several times.

That Diego should lose control is neither new nor surprising. He’s fired a gun at journalists in the past. What many find hard to stomach is that the football authorities in Argentina should defend his behaviour.

What the controversy is doing is shifting attention from the fact that Maradona, working with some of the best players in the world, has produced a team that would struggle to hold its own in the Argentine third division.

A journalist friend of mine was at the final team training session before the Uruguay match. He said that Maradona stood in the middle of the pitch with a whistle in his mouth looking like a bored dad at a Sunday morning park kick-around with his kids. Only this wasn’t the morning since Diego doesn’t get up before midday and all his training sessions start well after lunch.

There was no planning, no talk of tactics, just comments like: “Nice pass, Messi,” and “Run Heinze!”

“Hey you! What’s your name? Good shot. I’ll play you on Wednesday, instead of Tevez. Be in Uruguay by 6pm. Bring a dark blue away shirt and a spare towel and tell your mum you’ll be back by Thursday.”

That’s how, I at least, imagine Mario Bolatti got in the team. Few outside of Argentine football and plenty in it had ever heard of the Huracan attacker before Maradona brought him on as a substitute on Wednesday night. While some of the most expensive talent playing in Europe sat on the bench trying to decide which car they were going to buy next week, Diego brought on the boy who must earn less than Lionel Messi spends on designer bootlaces.

There was a national shaking of heads and a collective moan of exasperation. What on earth was Maradona playing at? But Bolatti, as we now know, responded by poking in a winning goal worth more to Argentina than a Christmas hamper full of Messis, Tevezes and Agueros.

Wouldn't have happened in my day

OK, with results elsewhere, we also now know that Argentina didn’t even have to win this one. But what the result did do was prove that Diego Maradona was right and everyone else was wrong, at least in his eyes. And that appears to be his main motivation. Not impressing the world and Argentines with the beauty of his team’s football – the kind of football he used to play. Oh no! His main motivation seems to be proving his detractors and doubters wrong and then rubbing their noses in the slimiest, foulest substance he can find.

Diego’s diatribes also go a fair way to distracting attention from the poor state of Argentine football in general and the man who’s presided over the national game from the late seventies, the head of the Argentine football association (AFA) and number two at FIFA, Julio Grondona. It was Mr Grondona who chose Diego, a man with little managerial experience and a suspect temperament, for the job. However, with friends in high places and in the media, criticism of the AFA president is as rare as a West Ham victory. He simply said his manager’s behaviour was justified given the pressure he’d been under.

Argentina continues to produce some of the best players in the world. More than one thousand play as professionals in leagues around the world, from England, Spain and Italy to Mexico, Thailand and Malta. Yet the quality of the domestic league is still pretty decent. This game between Argentinos Juniors and Racing produced some football as sublime as any I’ve seen anywhere, especially from the home team. Two first half goals did the business for Argentinos Juniors, the first from Andres Scotti with his hand – very apt in the Diego Maradona stadium where the stocky little idol began his professional career.

Yet something is rotten in Argentine football. Little of the money generated by the exports appears to get ploughed back into the national game. Many clubs are in debt and riddled with corruption. Others are plagued by criminal gangs working on the terraces. Some First division grounds would disgrace England’s non-professional leagues.  The Argentine Under-20s failed to qualify for the World Cup recently completed in Egypt. And now the national team coach is threatening to use his private parts as a lethal weapon.

Maradona survives on plenty of passion and the wilting affection of a nation whose memories of him as a player are increasingly hazy.  It might have been enough to get Argentina to South Africa, just.  But it won’t get them very far when the tournament kicks off. And even if did, scrambled last minute goals and wild-eyed rants are not how most Argentines would like to win the World Cup. Suck on that, Diego!