Celebrated around the world as a footballer, judged by others as a cheat, worshipped by many more as a God.

Diego Maradona’s death has affected billions all over the globe, beyond just the footballing world. Seen as the greatest of all time to many, and as a Messiah to many more, Maradona will remain in the hearts and in the minds of the people forever. A man who almost single-handedly took Argentina to World Cup glory as well as winning five trophies with Napoli and Barcelona including guiding Napoli to the club’s first and only, two league titles.

From being raised by a poor family in a shantytown in the southern outskirts of Buenos Aires, Maradona became a global star winning the World Cup and major honours in Europe, Maradona really went from rags to riches.

The 1986 Mexico World Cup, where Argentina were victorious, was the setting for Maradona’s most renowned moments. It is where Diego showed both his genius as well as his most controversial side. Possibly his most famous game, and one of the most legendary individual performances of all time, was the quarter final against England at the Mexico World Cup, where Argentina reached the semi-finals by defeating England by two goals to one. Diego scored both the Argentine goals. Both extraordinary, in two very different ways. The first came in the form of possibly the most famous goal, and certainly the most renowned bit of foul play in footballing history - the infamous ‘hand of god’ where Maradona quite literally punched the ball past Peter Shilton and into the England net. The second however, a stroke of pure genius, beginning well in his own half, Maradona practically waltzed through the whole England team, and passed the ball into the back of the net for his, and Argentina’s second.

As well as an Argentinian legend, he is celebrated in the city of Naples equally. Maradona was the main man in both of Napoli’s league title victories in 1987 and in 1990.

Towards the end of his life, he turned to drugs, and his poor health eventually got the better of him, and he passed-away from heart failure of the afternoon of the 25th of November 2020.

Three days of mourning began in Argentina on Wednesday after the news of his death. Thousands of people have been out on the streets in tears in Argentina and Napoli. The magnitude of his impact on football has been demonstrated in the past few days by the hundreds of tributes payed to him in sports stadia around the world, the thousands of people mourning his death out of the streets and the millions of tweets and posts on social media platform. Pele, Ronaldo and Messi are among the many legends who have publicly payed tribute to Maradona. Compatriot Lionel Messi reflected the whole of Argentina’s feelings in his recent Instagram post in which he pays tribute to Maradona ‘He leaves, but he doesn’t leave’ ‘Diego is eternal’.

The world has lost a true legend, he is gone but he will never be forgotten.