Greetings from the B-Side Brewery! I once again apologize for neglecting this newsletter. But I do have some important news to share. My indie rock band the Roland High Life has a new song out today called “The Edge of Memory,” that one reviewer called, “the summer banger that you didn’t know you needed in your life right now.” It’s available now on all the streaming/digital platforms.
We’ll also be headlining our first show at O’Brien’s Pub in Allston next Sunday, July 19. This is the last time we’ll get to play OBie’s before the club’s much-anticipated renovations, and it’d be super cool if we could really pack the place. If you’re in the Boston area and you haven’t seen my awesome rock n’ roll group yet — please come out! I know it’s a Sunday night, but it’s also an early show and guaranteed to be done by 10pm. You could go out and watch the final game of the World Cup at 3pm, then come straight to our show, and still get to work in the morning, or get your kids to summer camp, or whatever. What’s better than that?
And speaking of the World Cup …
Remember that time Argentina beat England in the championships by illegally punching a ball into the goal?
A few years back, I had the privilege of writing for the popular celebrity true crime podcast Disgraceland. My output on that show included one particular delightful episode about Argentinian soccer legend Diego Maradona, who is perhaps best known for winning the World Cup in 1986 by blatantly cheating.
I found it to be a genuinely fascinating story, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately, as I’ve contended with the hordes of kilted Scotsmen taking over my neighbor. So I wanted to share the opening scene I wrote, dramatizing that infamous play (and the crucial geopolitical context around it). If you want to listen to the full episode, you can find it here. It’s worth it, too; that guy’s life was wild.
Diego Maradona weaved his way around the English defense, pirouetting down the pitch with his shoulders straight and his chest puffed proudly. At five-foot-five, he looked more like a horse jockey than a soccer player. But he moved with the grace of a gazelle and the ferociousness of a wolverine.
The other team just couldn’t keep up.
Maradona dashed towards the goal looking for an opening where his Argentinian teammate could make the pass. He got so far down the pitch that he should have been off-sides. But the ball ricocheted off another English player, so it switched possession in mid-flight — and Maradona was ready for it.
Alone in the penalty box, he saw the keeper coming towards him. The two players jumped into the air right as the ball crested and began to fall. This British bastard had a full eight inches over Maradona. But the stocky Argentinian could practically fly. He arched his head back, raising his left fist beside him like some triumphant uppercut slicing through the wind — and punched the ball into the goal.
If you know anything about soccer, you know you’re not supposed to use your hands. Especially not in the final game of a World Cup championship. But miraculously, the refs didn’t see it. It just looked like a headbutt to them. So they called the goal for Argentina, despite the protests from the English team. Maradona smiled as he watched the scoreboard change.
“La mano de Dios,” he said. It was the hand of God.
A few minutes later, he made a sixty-yard dash with five wankers guarding him at once, and scored another goal, winning the 1986 World Cup for Argentina.
Maradona carried his team to victory that day.
But it was more than just a game.
It was justice.
Retribution.
The latest salvo in a centuries-long war against the colonial elite.
Let’s back up. In the early 1800s, the British Empire tried to conquer the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires. Several times. In 1833, they came for Islas Malvinas, an archipelago off the country’s Atlantic coast. They claimed the land as their own. They called it the Falkland Islands. The Argentinians did not like this. But they couldn’t do much to stop it. The relationship between the countries soured even more after a bad trade agreement in the 1930s. The United Nations tried to mediate the tensions in the 1960s. But the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands was still up for debate.
This was right around the time that Diego Maradona was born. He was raised in a slum on the outskirts of Buenos Aires by a father who came from the indigenous Guaraní people, and a mother descended from Southern Italian immigrant workers. They lived in a shack made from cardboard and scrap metal, with dirt for a floor and reeds for a roof. His parents didn’t struggle to keep the lights on — they were too poor to afford lights.
Soccer was Maradona’s only escape from shantytown life. He spent all his free time honing his footwork in a way that defied the rules of traditional training. His movement was unrefined, but also unpredictable — a unique athletic creole, made even more amazing by his short, stocky stature. He was an underdog in every way.
At 15, Maradona dropped out of school and signed an exclusive contract with the local professional soccer club, the Argentinos Juniors. He was the youngest player in the history of the league. Soon he became the primary breadwinner for his family. Crowds swarmed the stadium to see him in action — and make some money placing bets on whatever wild move he’d pull this time. After five years, he moved to another Argentine club, the Boca Juniors.
And then, everything changed, and nothing was ever the same.
In 1982, just as Maradona was preparing to play his first World Cup tournament, Argentina’s military invaded the Falkland Islands, hoping to reclaim the colonized land. Argentinian national pride was high — for a few weeks, anyway. But the country’s scrappy armed forces were no match for the British Empire. Argentina faced a humiliating defeat.
This was an eye-opening moment for Maradona. It awakened his awareness of the world’s injustices — of colonial oppression, and fascist propaganda.
So yeah, when he punched that ball into the goal four years later in a match against England, Maradona was technically cheating. But as far as he and half the Global South were concerned, England had been cheating for a long, long time. It was only fair. Maradona had just given them a taste of their own medicine. England crushed them in the war, but Argentina won where it really counted: on the soccer pitch.
Shortly after the Falklands War, Maradona was sold overseas to play for Barcelona. It was the most expensive trade in professional soccer history at the time. Though Barcelona is technically in Spain, it’s also part of Catalonia, an autonomous region that’s had its own struggles with sovereignty. In other words, it was the perfect place for Maradona to cement his international reputation as a champion for the oppressed, a man whose only weapon…was a soccer ball.
The Barcelona team had a longstanding rivalry with Athletic Bilbao, who saw a major threat in Maradona. During one match, Athletic’s center-back, affectionately known as “The Butcher of Bilbao,“ got so mad at the thought of losing to a filthy, low-class indigenous Argentinian that he tackled Maradona in the middle of a play. Maradona’s ankle snapped like a twig. The injury sidelined him for months.
But that wasn’t even the worst of it. The tension between the teams continued to boil. It came to a head at the 1984 Cup finals in Madrid. 100,000 screaming fans in the stadium. But not just regular soccer fans. Royalty. The King of Spain himself.
During the kickoff, Barcelona’s fans booed the Spanish national anthem. It should have been a powerful moment of Catalonian national pride. But one Bilbao player used the noise as a cover to taunt Maradona.
How’s that ankle feeling? Be a shame if something happened to it…
As the game got underway, Maradona saw him coming from the corner of his eye. The Butcher. Shoulders slunk down low and aimed like a bull’s horn. He ran straight into Maradona and tackled him. Maradona hit the ground with a thud and rolled over on his back. He looked up to see the sneering center-back standing right above him. The Butcher lifted his leg up in the air, threatening to flatten Maradona’s face into the turf. That was all he needed. The Butcher saw the fear in Maradona’s eyes. He’d made his point. He laughed like a madman, then spit on the ground next to Maradona’s face. Pathetic coward.
Maradona was pissed. And embarrassed. But mostly pissed. He tried to keep his cool. At least until the end of the match. The whistle blew, and the refs declared that Bilbao had won the cup, with a score of 1 nil. As the bummed-out Barcelona team skulked back to the locker room, Bilbao’s midfielder called out after Maradona, goading him with racial slurs that dug into his heritage.
Cabecita negra. Blackhead.
Maradona heard the words. He stopped dead in his tracks. He spun around and leapt three feet through the air, kneeing that motherfucker right in the face while still in mid-flight.
The bastard was unconscious before the blood even gushed from his nose. His teammates retaliated, lunging at Maradona, who immediately erupted into a flurry of lo-fi kung fu kicks. Luckily for Maradona, his teammates had his back. They sprung into action beside him, and within seconds, the entire pitch was a massive street fight. Bodies were pummeled and beaten and tossed around. It didn’t take long for the fans and the riot cops to charge the field and join the violent fray, too.
When the brawl was over, more than 60 people were injured.
And the entire time, the King of Spain just sat there and watched from his seat safely in the stands, knowing full well that the whole shameful ruckus started because some uppity Indian from Argentina refused to be put in his place.
Oh hey did you know that it’s hot out
Good news! You’re probably living through the coldest summer of the rest of your life!
That’s also the bad news! Sorry!
But don’t worry, I’m on the case. Over at The New York Times’ Wirecutter, I’ve been cranking out that cool summer content, writing about everything from air conditioners and neck fans to portable window heat pumps and weird Shai-Hulud-like cooling devices. I’ve also tried to explain to readers why de-humidification is sometimes more important than cooling, and also why you might actually save more to save energy by leaving your AC on during the day when you’re not home. (That last one apparently challenged a lot of people’s reading comprehension skills, oof.)
I’ve got some other stuff in the pipelines too, but mostly I’ve been focused on keeping cool. Lucky for you, it’s a natural talent of mine. Ya dig?
Anyway, go listen to my band’s new song — just look at that album art! Hopefully I’ll see some of your lovely faces next Sunday, July 19 at O’Brien’s Pub in Allston. ‘Til then: stay cool, take care of each other, and keep on fighting the good fight.