22 June 1986, Azteca. Argentina 2–1 England. By Hamish McTavish
You already know the two goals. What you might not have is the week they spent deciding the problem was one man.
Quarter-final. The Azteca. A World Cup last eight, and the English week had narrowed to a single name. Gary Stevens later said Bobby Robson had asked about his man-marking because they were considering a specialist on Diego Maradona. They did not do it. They went with the midfield they had and the idea that England, at this stage of a World Cup, do not lose to one player. The plan was contain Diego. The plan was England. They had come to keep one man quiet and leave with a semi-final. They left with two goals against and a decision to talk about.
Contain. Not beat. Not outplay. Contain. Robson asked the question and then answered it the English way, which is to assume eleven will be enough and one man will not be the night. Stevens had been asked. Stevens was not used. The marker stayed a conversation. Diego stayed a plan.
The first fifty minutes were a game that had not yet become the night. England were in it. The plan was still a plan. Diego was a problem you could still point at, which is the last easy feeling England get on these evenings. Then the hour turned.
Fifty-one minutes. Maradona went up with Peter Shilton and the ball went in off a fist. Shilton favourite for it. Tunisian referee. The fist won. Maradona started running, shouted goal, and checked whether the referee had taken the bait. He had. A man who thinks he has headed it does not check. A man who has used a hand checks. Shilton came down with nothing. The Azteca came up with everything. England came up with a grievance, which they would still be holding when the second one arrived.
They had about four minutes to stay angry about a hand. They used them. Then he picked the ball up in his own half — not a set piece, not a plan England had written down, just the place where contain Diego was supposed to begin — and walked through Peter Reid, Terry Butcher, Terry Fenwick, the lot, and rolled it past Shilton as if the goalkeeper had been painted on. That is the Goal of the Century, and it arrived while England were still arguing about the first one. Reid. Butcher. Fenwick. Grown England players, in a World Cup quarter-final, turned into traffic. He did not chip them. He did not need them to fall over. He went through the midfield they had trusted to contain him, through the centre-halves who were supposed to be the rest of the plan, and the Azteca knew before Shilton did. Contain Diego. He had just done it twice, in two different sports, before the hour was up.
That is the night. Not one goal. Two. The first one they will talk about until they die, because a hand is a grievance you can hold. The second one they change the subject from, because there is no grievance in being walked through. You can take a bad decision to a committee. You cannot take Reid, Butcher and Fenwick to a committee and ask for the grass back.
Gary Lineker got one back with his head. John Barnes tore in late. It did not matter. A header and a late run are what you put in the report when the night has already gone. Lineker did the thing Lineker does. Barnes did the thing they always say they should have started earlier. You can put Lineker and Barnes in the report. You cannot put them in the hour that decided it. A header is a reply. A late run is a reply. Two–one is still the walk home, and the two were his.
Maradona, after: “a little with the head of Maradona and a little with the hand of God.” He had already told you the method on the pitch: run, shout, check. The official agreed. That is the first goal: a fist, a shout, a check, a Tunisian referee who took the bait, and a goalkeeper who had been favourite for a ball that was never his. Shilton was still in the air when the argument started, and the argument has not landed yet. He gave them the line they wanted and kept the night he had taken.
Robson: “The first goal was a disgrace but the second goal was a miracle.” And: “That is a bad decision in a very big match. We don’t expect decisions like that at World Cup level.” They can have the disgrace. They can have the miracle. They still went home. He wanted the first one taken off and the second one filed under weather. The night does not file. The night is both of them. If you only talk about the hand you are doing the English column. If you only talk about the second you are being polite. He scored twice, in eight minutes, in front of the Azteca, which knew.
Shilton reached for a ball that was already decided. The trail of Englishmen behind the second goal is the picture. Robson on the touchline discovered that righteousness is not a tactic. Stevens had been asked, and not used. Reid, Butcher, Fenwick had been used, and left on the grass. Lineker had a header. Barnes had a late gallop. Maradona had the night. The plan had been contain Diego. The night had been Diego, then Diego again, then England looking for a decision to stand on. Everyone has the hand. If that is all you have, you do not have the night. The tape has both, which is why the English column prefers the first one and goes quiet on the second.
They said contain Diego. They said a bad decision in a very big match. They said we don’t expect that at World Cup level. They said disgrace, then miracle, then home. If you still think it was only the hand, a funeral is only a Tuesday.
The film is up. The fist, then the run. Do not review it. Watch it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRAbNlPS2MI
They get surer. It gets worse. Next time a country of 330,000 and a throw they had on tape. Come back for that one.