Shocking News: Mauro Scaloni, Lionel Scaloni’s Brother, Detained in Extortion Case at U.S. Embassy

Mauro Scalonibrother of the coach of the Argentine National Team, Lionel Scaloni, was detained by police personnel while he was carrying out a procedure at the United States Embassy, ​​located in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Palermo. According to judicial sources, it has to do with a case linked to “extortion and coercive threats”.

Mauro was notified of the lawsuit being worked on by the Santa Fe Investigation and Trial Unit, headed by Dr. Viviana O’Connell, and was then released.

The brother of the Argentine coach, who was also a soccer player and had a stint in Europe, was accompanying his wife, who had a turn to obtain the visa that allows entry to American soil.

The news surprised the football environment and comes when the coach is preparing to begin a friendly tour with the National Team, coincidentally in the United States. There they will have to face El Salvador, on March 22, in Philadelphia, and then they will play against Costa Rica, on the 26th of this month but in Los Angeles.

Who is Mauro Scaloni, Lionel’s brother

Mauro José Scaloni47 years old, is two years older and a few hairs younger than his brother Lionelnext to whom he grew up in Pujato and with whom he began to kick a ball in the Club Atlético Sportivo Matienzo, one of two in the town of around 4,000 inhabitants (the other is Club Atlético Pujato). Since then, Their paths did not separate for years, thanks to Ángel’s insistence.the father and representative of both.

Lionel and Mauro trained in the lower divisions of Newell’s. The youngest made his debut in the First Division on April 30, 1995 (16 days before his 17th birthday), in a match against San Lorenzo, and played 12 games in just over a year. On the other hand, the oldest, who served as a forward marker, only had activity in the Reserve of the Rosario team.

Mauro and Lionel Scaloni joined Estudiantes de La Plata in August 1996.

In mid-1996 and after a harsh negotiation with the leadership headed by Eduardo López, the Scaloni were free and in August of that year they joined the Students of La Plata on Angel’s initiative. There they repeated the dynamic: Lionel quickly established himself in First Division, to the point that his outstanding performance took him to the U-20 team that, led by José Pekerman, won the title at the 1997 World Cup in Malaysia; Mauro once again had to settle for a place in the Reserve.

Seeing his brother relegated was not pleasant for him. Leo and that came to generate a conflict on campus. At least that’s what the former midfielder revealed Manuel Santos Aguilarwho, in an interview he gave to the La Plata newspaper ‘El Día’ in 2019, said that Scaloni had refused to play a Super Cup match against Gremio de Porto Alegre in September 1997 because the team’s coach, Daniel Córdoba, had not included Mauro in the tournament’s good faith list.

“He had a bad attitude with the team and we had to cover for him. He had all the support of his family and he told Edgardo Valente, the president at that time, that he was not going to play. We had to keep our mouths shut so as not to turn all the people against us. He made us angry and we talked to him. He justified himself by explaining about his brother. He was surely very young at that time and he was poorly advised,” Aguilar said.

Mauro and Lionel Scaloni with Ángel, their father.

When that incident occurred, the Scaloni days in the Pinch They were numbered. At the end of August, Deportivo La Coruña had announced an agreement in principle to incorporate Lionel. The operation ended up being completed in December, although not without difficulties, since the ownership of the player’s record was gibberish (Newell’s claimed a part; Estudiantes had to, before selling him, pay a sum to the family).

“It has been one of the most complicated signings in the history of the club,” he said. Augusto César Lendoiro during the presentation of the new reinforcement at the Deportivo headquarters in the Plaza de Pontevedra in La Coruña. But next to him there was not one player, but two: again by the work and grace of Ángel, Mauro had also been included in the negotiation. For the brothers, the Galician club paid 2.7 million dollars, although he made a commitment to pay a similar amount if after three years he decided to keep the players.

It was clear that Lionel arrived to play in the team led by José Manuel Corral and that was bidding to avoid relegation in the Spanish League. It was also clear that there was no place for Mauro in a squad that had 18 foreign footballers from eight countries. Therefore, his destiny was Sports Factorythe subsidiary team of Testifywho was active in the Second B.

While his brother followed a path that would lead him to be a figure, captain and idol of a club that he represented in 301 games and with which he won four titles (a Spanish League, a Copa del Rey and two Spanish Super Cups), Mauro He remained at Fabril for nine years, a rather atypical fact, since the squads of teams that function as a reserve team usually draw on young players who take their final steps before jumping into the main team. For him, that chance never came.

Mauro and Lionel Scaloni arrived in La Coruña in December 1997 and left in mid-2006.

In March 2005, Mauro was not taken into account by coach Tito Ramallo, a Deportivo legend who led Fabril for more than a decade. And again Lionel raised his voice for him. “From my point of view, the club has made a serious mistake by not using him for so long. “He is experiencing a very unfair situation and he wants to feel like a footballer again.”, he said in an interview published in the newspaper As. And he suggested that his brother could return to Argentina to play for Estudiantes. That didn’t happen.

The Scaloni had arrived together in La Coruña. And together they left the city. In mid-2006 and despite still having one year left on his contract, Mauro left the Galician club. His brother also did it, who had played in the World Cup in Germany with the team led by José Pekerman, but was not considered by coach Joaquín Caparrós, even though he was the captain of the team.

Mauro returned to Pujato, works in the fields and is still linked to soccer in the local league.

Lionel joined Racing de Santander and then played for Lazio, Mallorca and Atalanta before his retirement in 2015. Mauro, on the other hand, ended not only his career, but also his experience in Europe, despite having spent almost a decade there and had forged strong friendships. His future after the ball was written. “I never thought I would stay there. I knew that mine was the field and I always knew that when I finished my career, I was going to return to payments,” he said in an interview on Cadena 3 in August of this year.

Mauro and his anecdote with Lionel at the Qatar World Cup

In recent years, the elder brother of the National Team coach dedicated himself to agricultural activity. He does it in the fields that the family has on the outskirts of Pujato, mainly dedicated to raising livestock and planting wheat. Plus, he allows her to be close to his parents.

There, inland and disconnected from the world, was where Mauro suffered the Qatar World Cup match between Argentina and Mexico, when the National Team led by his brother was risking its future in the competition.

Mauro Scaloni with the clothing of the Club Atlético Sportivo Matienzo de Pujato.

“I received a message from my brother, crying…”, Lionel said that day in a press conference, after the 2-0 that served as a take-off for the team. And he continued, with a reflective tone that ended up marking his cycle: “He told me that he had gone to the field, that he had not heard the game. It can’t be. The feeling is that you are playing something more than a football game and you can’t. “I share it. We have to correct it.”

“I went to the field, I couldn’t stand the pressure. I haven’t watched television since Tuesday. I couldn’t get over my nerves. We were threshing wheat. I turned off the phone, I turned off everything. I didn’t see anything, I didn’t hear anything. It was 40 degrees. I turned on the air conditioning, I threw the seat back and waited,” Mauro said.

And he continued: “When I turned on the radio, the reporter shouted: ‘Argentina won.’ You don’t know the knot I had in my belly. There I grabbed the phone and sent my brother the message he told me.”

Although he decided to move away from professional football when he closed his time at Deportivo Fabril, Mauro did not completely separate himself from the ball. Since he returned to Pujato he has actively collaborated with Matienzo, his childhood club, which a couple of years ago had a team again in the Casildense Liga Primera after eight years of absence.