He leaves for Abu Dhabi: a group from the United Arab Emirates would have paid more than 9 million dollars for Maradona’s shirt

The authenticity of one of the most famous garments in world football was in question from the first moment, a controversy that ignited from the crack family. Finally, british auction site Sotheby’s sold the shirt with which, according to several tests, Diego Armando Maradona converted both goals against England in the quarterfinals of the World Cup in Mexico 86. The jacket remained in the possession of the former English soccer player Steve Hodgewho exchanged it with the captain of the Argentine team after that unforgettable encounter, and which had been put up for auction on April 20 at a London gallery.

At the close, at noon in our country, Sotheby’s announced that the winning bid was £7,142,500, the approximate equivalent of $9,200,000.. Y It would have remained in the hands of a group from Abu Dhabi, close to the people who manage Manchester City. On the first day, an offer had appeared for 4 million pounds sterling (just over five million dollars) to keep the emblematic nylon number 10, which was outbid just before the auction closed.

In the last few hours, the news site itvnews reported that an Argentine delegation came to London to try to buy the jacket, starting with an offer of more than 5 million pounds. The group is led by Marcelo Ordas, owner of Legends, a firm that brings together the largest private collection of used shirts in the world. As reported by journalist Chloe Keedy, Ordás worked together with the Argentine Football Association to obtain the coveted object.

According to the British chronicler, Ordás told her that the Maradona family is not happy with the auction and believes that the shirt should be in Argentina, where it belongs. “He says he is here to win.”

However, Ordás was not reached. Through tears, the collector said that he did everything he could: “This armor, this relic was to be taken home and that all world football lovers can appreciate it. And it was the spearhead for there to be a cultural heritage of the most important Argentine team in history. I apologize, we did everything in our power.” The collector thanked the people who supported this initiative, such as the Barcelona footballer Gerard Piqué and the president of the AFA, Claudio Chiqui Tapia.

And in a chat with Radio Metro, Ordás described the end of the auction: “I thought we won it because behind me there are many people who accompanied this crusade. On the other side there were people from the Middle East with much more economic resources, not with more historical and passionate resources like ours. There were 17 seconds left and we were the best offer”.

Marcelo Ordás is a renowned collector. In 2018, for example, he went to the Vatican where he handed over to Pope Francis -a well-known fan of San Lorenzo- the shirt worn by his idol René Pontoni, when the Boedo team won the 1946 championship.

Ordás has collectible pieces such as the shirt Tata Brown wore in the final against Germany in 1986 -the one he tore to be able to put his finger in and play without pain due to the injury he had sustained to his shoulder- and also that of Claudio Caniggia with the one that scored the goal against Brazil, in the quarterfinals of the Italy 90 World Cup. Regarding the latter, Ordás said that he was 17 years old and was able to access the locker room after that match. There he melted into a hug with the striker, who gave him the shirt. At that moment the idea of ​​starting his collection arose.

Since it became known that Hodge had delivered to the traditional auction house Sotheby’s, the legendary shirt that Maradona gave him on June 22, 1986, after Argentina’s victory over England, the controversy surrounding the authenticity of it has been triggered. . “I have been the proud owner of this garment for more than 35 years, ever since Diego and I exchanged shirts in the tunnel after the famous match. It was an absolute privilege to have played against one of the greatest and most magnificent football players of all time”, Hodge had declared. And who went directly to the Hodge intersection was one of the daughters of the Argentine star, Dalma Maradona: “He (Hodge) doesn’t have the two goals but he can’t say because, of course, the other one has much more value. There are two jerseys, one from the first half and one from the second.”.

According to Dalma, the shirt that Hodge has is the one that Maradona used in the first half of the game (the two goals were in the second half) and that the shirt of the unforgettable goals was left for his family. The star’s daughter did not want to reveal who has it and denied that it was Claudia, her mother, who appears in a photo wearing a similar shirt. “I don’t confirm it, my dad said it. ‘How am I going to give him the most important shirt of my life?’”Dalma emphasized.

The now famous blue shirt for the match against England has a very particular history, which in current times of super-professionalism seems impossible to believe. For the 86 World Cup, the firm Le Coq supplied the selected team with three types of shirts: the original, light blue and white with sticks, plus two alternatives, one blue and one white.

In the group stage, against South Korea, Italy and Bulgaria, Argentina used the starter. Already in the round of 16, as Uruguay had a light blue shirt, FIFA decided that our country’s team should use an alternative. So, it was the turn of the blue. However, that jacket did not have the same properties as the light blue and white one, called honeycomb, since it had small holes that made it lighter. The blue one, on the other hand, with perspiration and rainwater, became very heavy.

For this reason, for the quarterfinal match against England, in which FIFA again urged Argentina to play it with an alternative (the English used white), Carlos Bilardo ordered the prop man Rubén Benrós and the AFA administrator, Rubén Moschella, to go to stores in Mexico to get a light blue Le Coq shirt. The fruitless search finally gave result. They bought 40 jerseys at a store and then got some silver (football) numbers to stamp on their backs. It only remained to put the shield on them. That was the task of the cleaning employees of the Club América property, where the Argentine team was concentrated. By hand, they sewed each shield one by one. The rest is history.