The Football Boots of MARADONA

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But where the likes of the Adidas Predator and the Nike Mercurial Vapor have flourished, the PUMA King has failed to follow suit. In December of 2019, a listicle published by popular online football publication SoccerBible ranked what were they believed to be the greatest 30 boots of the last decade. Naturally, subjectivity plays its part, but there was a notable omission: despite new models, the famed PUMA King failed to make the cut. Then came a five-minute cameo where Maradona showed the world the two extremes of his on-pitch character: the cunning, opportunistic cheat and the untouchable, unplayable, footballing maestro. Knave or knight? Almost certainly both. When they returned to their base the players held hands and took a lap of honour around the training ground. It’s a question that seems at once entirely trivial and greatly intriguing when one considers the kind of glittering legacy such a boot has behind it. Seemingly everyone saw the handball - everyone apart from Tunisian referee Ali bin Nasser and Bulgarian linesman Bogdan Dochev.

SUPER CUP replica (left) and early COPA MUNDIAL model. The SUPER CUP and WINNER were in Adi-calf leather, and, to repeat, the COPA MUNDIAL was the first adidas moulded studs model with kangaroo leather upper at the time. And perhaps it is this perception of the PUMA King, borne out of a seemingly romantic sense of nostalgia — during today’s era of constant change and ever-increasing flamboyance — that lends itself perfectly to being the natural accompaniment to the type of player it is now associated with. Loyal, dependable, unglamorous. Now with one of the King's greatest ever wearers about to celebrate his 50th birthday, Puma have created a unique Diego Maradona boot to unveil the latest incarnation - The King Finale. These boots not only feature a bespoke colourway, but also the squad number and signature of the football legend that is Diego Armando Maradona! It was a toxic, febrile atmosphere stoked up by the media - the Falklands War still fresh in minds - that guaranteed this was never going to be just another game.But look closer. Maradona is wearing his top differently. It looks like he's taken a spare set of shoelaces and cinched them around his waist like a makeshift belt. He returned to training before the third group match against Bulgaria but tore a muscle in his left leg. The team doctor claimed the player had intensified his training without permission, while the player insisted he broke down after being forced to play. But amid all that, the boots he wore that summer have become iconic. They are inseparable from the man and that summer when he led his country to victory over West Germany in the final. Recently, an overseas football boots enthusiast wrote an article here, which included the following Four-time NBA champion James, now 36 and playing for the Los Angeles Lakers, has arguably fulfilled predictions of being the best ever. A piece of sporting history in the form of an early LeBron James basketball top is also available (Julien’s Auctions/PA)

Three and a half minutes after the controversy came the goal which to this day is described as one of the greatest goals ever scored. A goal that would never have happened had Bin Nasser blown the whistle for an obvious foul on Glenn Hoddle in the action that preceded it.For a game that will forever be remembered as one of the most significant of all time, it had a pretty mundane first half.

Of the ubiquitous ingredients constituting any quintessential Sunday morning scrap, there is one brand of football boot that, for many, encapsulates the endearing madness better than any other: the PUMA King. Celebrating the 30th anniversary of the Mexico ’86 World Cup, PUMA have reissued the boot that led Argentina and Diego Maradona to glory. A king for a king, it's a heritage beauty styled all over.During the second half of his career, Maradona struggled with cocaine addiction and was banned for 15 months after testing positive for the drug in 1991. You know it's not the present because of the old-school signage for brands that were once household names, like AGFA, who made film for cameras, and Commodore, the computer company that went bust more than a quarter of a century ago. And, of course, the crowd behind is blurry: still intelligible, but not defined to the standards of our HD era. Napoli's warm-up gear is decidedly old school. Brands like Mars don't sponsor clubs these days, and nobody wears those baggy tops.