Fighting fire with fire
Tim Vickery
In 1986 I was 21, had never made it out of England and found it easy to be carried along with the general indignation surrounding Diego Maradonas Hand of God goal.
I loved watching Maradona at his peak how could any football fan not do so and cheered for him to hit the heights of his other goal the one where he dribbled the entire England defence against Belgium and West Germany. But deep down I felt a spark of anger about the illegal goal that had helped eliminate my team.
My view began to change the following year when I saw the official film of Mexico 86. There, in that very England-Argentina quarter final, as clear as day and with Michael Caine doing the voiceover, while the ball was at the other end of the field, was Terry Fenwicks elbow smashing into Maradonas face.
Suddenly I saw the light. This was the treatment that Maradona could expect to receive every time he set foot on the field. He would be kicked, punched, elbowed, spat on and provoked all because this little man had the skill to tip the balance of the match. Given a chance to gain revenge with a flick of the wrist, of course he would take it.
Surrounded as they are by physical and psychological violence, it is no wonder that footballs great players are prone to a touch of cynicism.
Brazils Zizinho, the outstanding player of the 1950 World Cup, once told me that in his day the talented players had to know how to time a foul tackle so that it would do real damage to an opponents leg. It was a necessary survival skill against the brutish defenders of the age.
The young Pelé was once taken aside and warned that unless he learnt to defend himself his career would end on page four. He took the lesson on board, and there is the odd broken nose and leg out there to prove it.
The great player is not the aggressor. He has no need to be. Skill is his weapon of choice but time and time again his skill is nullified by unfair or violent means. It is only natural, then, that he looks for ways to redress the balance.
Contemporary witnesses assert that Pelé was a master of conning the referee in to believing he had been fouled. He would entwine his arm with an opponents and haul them both to the ground, making it look as if he was the victim. His actions have an easy psychological defence; there were hundreds of times per game when he was impeded and was not given a foul.
Pelé has said that the South American defenders were in general more violent that the Europeans, because the Latin concept of machismo made them react strongly to being humiliated.
He is probably correct and he must still wince at those days when, before blanket TV coverage, the Copa Libertadores was more like the Wild West than a football competition.
But the European game is certainly faster and Maradona played his club football in Europe during perhaps the worst era for a player of his type.
According to Brazils physical preparation specialists in the 1970s a player would cover an average 5000 metres per match. By the 90s that figure had doubled.
So there was less space on the field and more physical contact but until the mid-90s clampdown on the clattering tackle from behind, there was no extra protection from the referee.
This was Maradonas era and it is a wonder that he emerged from it still able to walk.
Hopefully, stricter refereeing will mean that Lionel Messi should be running fewer risks. But if Chelseas Asier Del Horno had his way, Messi wouldnt be running at all. Hed be up in row Y of the stands trying to patch himself back together.
Maradona versus the English has flared up again. Only this time Messi is the little Argentine - bionic flea as Mario Kempes calls him and now the English need to import both the hard man and the coach who uses words to cover up his thuggery.
This is an extract from the Chelsea-Barcelona match report on the BBC website.
Messi escaped the attentions of Arjen Robben, but was halted by a clumsy challenge by the Chelsea defender [Del Horno].
The Argentine appeared to take a look at referee Terje Hauge before rolling around theatrically and when a melee including players from both sides had dispersed, Del Horno was sent off.
So Messi is the villain and Del Horno the victim! An extraordinary role reversal. And fuelled by José Mourinhos comments, this becomes the line for the lobotomized tabloid talking point.
The real story is, of course, quite different. Messi takes the field to play football, Del Horno to stop him. So far, so good. This is football. Attackers attack and defenders defend. But Del Horno is out of his class.
He can find no means of carrying out his task that fall within the laws of the game. He can hardly catch Messi to throw sand at his backside. So he resorts to violence and intimidation. He gets away with one thigh high assault. He doesnt get away with a brutal flying body-check.
And Messi is cast as the villain. Its enough to make anyone cynical.
But if English football really wants a talking point, perhaps it should be asking itself why it is importing the likes of Del Horno rather than producing the likes of Messi.
