Maradona's reign with Argentine national team will be a wild ride

By Brian Homewood, Special to SI.com, World Soccer

In a friendly at Scoland in November, his first game in charge of Argentina, Diego Maradona attracted more attention than his players. Jeff J. Mitchell/Getty Images

As a player, Oscar Ruggeri bludgeoned his way through 97 games for Argentina, winning one World Cup and two Copa América titles to become one of his country's most successful internationals. His coaching career, on the other hand, has been an extraordinary run of failure. It began reasonably well at San Lorenzo, when he was close to winning the championship in his first season. But it has been all downhill since then.

Known affectionately as "Big Head," Ruggeri resigned at Mexico's Tecos UAG after losing his first six games in 2003, then returned home to join Independiente, where he quit four months later after being jeered by fans at a home game.

In '04, he tried his luck at Spanish second-division club Elche, but was fired after 20 games. Then he returned to Mexico and joined América, the country's richest club, and this time lasted six matches. In '06, it was back to San Lorenzo, where he was again fired after poor results, including a 7-1 home defeat to Boca Juniors.

It is not exactly inspiring stuff, yet Diego Maradona's insistence on hiring Ruggeri as his assistant whipped up the first storm of his reign as Argentina coach.

Maradona originally announced that Sergio Batista and José Luis Brown, two more former teammates from the '86 World Cup-winning team, would be his assistants. It seemed like a good move. The mild-mannered Batista appeared to be the perfect foil for the volatile Maradona and recently led Argentina to Olympic gold with an impressive 3-0 win over Brazil on the way. Brown had been working quietly in the background as coach of the Under-17 team.

Without warning, however, Maradona backtracked and, at his official presentation, said his assistant(s) had yet to be decided. Shortly afterwards, it emerged Ruggeri was top of his list. This quickly turned into a soap opera. With Maradona's opening game against Scotland only a week away, FA president Julio Grondona announced there was no way he would accept Ruggeri's presence in the coaching staff, saying: "I don't like his face. It's a personal thing."

Maradona, it was said, would not budge, and speculation mounted that he could even quit over the matter only a week after taking over. In the end, Ruggeri defused the row by telling Maradona to go to Scotland without him and worry about it afterwards. "We'll speak again," he said. "I would be delighted to help but, if not, I will support him from the sidelines as I have always done."

Many critics had feared Maradona's appointment could turn the national side into something of a circus, but few could have imagined for the entertainment to start so soon. For most of Grondona's 29-year reign, the national side has become an oasis of tranquility. All but two of his six coaches have completed the four-year cycle ending at a World Cup, and those who failed to make it -- Marcelo Bielsa and Alfio Basile -- resigned rather than being sacked.

That is clearly going to change with Maradona at the helm. The Scotland friendly last November produced utter mayhem throughout his five-day stay in Glasgow -- and it was the coach, rather than the players, who attracted the attention. For the media, it's a dream. Argentina has four 24-hour news channels, three cable sports channels and a host of radio stations, all desperate to fill airtime. Bielsa infuriated them by refusing to give exclusive interviews and hiding himself away on a farm outside Rosario. Maradona and his entourage, on the other hand, play exactly to the rules.

Someone in Maradona's party will leak information to one or two of the channels, who then flash it across the screen. Their rivals then follow suit. Hours of speculation and excitement follow as the anchors interview their own reporters. Then, rather conveniently, Maradona himself pops up on one or two of his favored channels to give an "exclusive" interview clarifying the situation. Once that has happened, it's on to the analysis and ramifications, which fill a few more hours. No wonder the media supported his appointment while the public thought it was a bad idea (roughly 70 percent said they were opposed).

Maradona's appointment was clearly a bid to galvanize a team which had won one and drawn six of its previous eight matches. Since its shabby display at the '90 World Cup, Argentina has cleaned up its act, concentrating on playing neat, attacking soccer. Unfortunately, it has failed to win anything since the '93 Copa América while a more physical, pragmatic Brazil has walked off with two World Cups and four Copa Américas in the same period.

The presence of Carlos Bilardo, Argentina's '86 and '90 World Cup coach, as "general manager," and Maradona's desire to bring in Ruggeri could be signs a more ruthless style is on the way back. Now 69, the fast-talking Bilardo has cut a rather eccentric figure. During his last coaching stint with Estudiantes a couple years ago, he responded to allegations that he was taking the game too seriously by sitting on the touchline during one match next to a small table and sipping "champagne" from a glass. It turned out to be a sports drink.

But there are no doubts about Bilardo's attitude to fair play. During his playing days, he was known to take a pin onto the field and stick it into his opponents at inconvenient moments. As a coach, he would have his players smear heat cream on their fingers then rub it into an opponent's eyes during the match. And he has long been suspected of offering contaminated water to Brazil during their '90 World Cup match.

Maradona next has a friendly in France in February. After that, the real business begins with eight World Cup qualifiers over six months. Argentina's position is far from comfortable. Although third in the 10-team group, it's ahead of Chile only on goal difference and three points clear of fifth place, whose final occupants will face a two-leg playoff against a CONCACAF side, possibly Mexico.

Argentina's run-in is anything but easy as it still faces trips to high-altitude Bolivia and Ecuador, meets Brazil at home and finishes it all off by visiting neighbors and bitter rival Uruguay. Maradona & Co. cannot afford to get it wrong.

This article originally appeared in the January 2009 issue of World Soccer magazine. To subscribe, click here.