30 years on: Maradona's 'hand of God'

Thirty years ago today, the world looked on in awe and disbelief as a diminutive football genius from a shanty town in Buenos Aires secured a permanent place in sporting lore. Twice.

Diego Armando Maradona was not a man who needed a defining moment. Outrageously gifted, the Argentinian schemer was a serial architect of the sublime, a masterful tamer of the ball who regularly left opponents and spectators dumbfounded. Jaw-dropping, game-changing showmanship was his stock-in-trade, but he outdid himself on 22 June 1986 against England in a FIFA World Cup quarter-final in Mexico City.

Carlos Bilardo's Albiceleste went into the much-anticipated game as favourites, but England were far from makeweights. With Peter Shilton in goal, the imposing Terry Butcher at centre-back and Glenn Hoddle pulling the strings behind tournament top scorer Gary Lineker, they boasted talent of their own. What they lacked, of course, was Maradona. The stocky No10 was the one bright spot in a tentative first half played amid searing midday heat.

Maradona leaves England trailing©Getty Images

So far, so forgettable. But destiny beckoned at the Estadio Azteca. Six minutes after the restart, with players congregating on the edge of England's area, Maradona angled a pass towards Jorge Valdano on the right and continued his run in the hope of a return. It duly came, only via England's Steve Hodge, whose sliced interception sent the ball looping towards his own goal.

Shilton raced out to punch it away before Maradona could leap and head in. Up went both players, Shilton appearing poised to make contact, yet somehow the ball ended up in the net. Maradona, 1.65m tall, had got there first. "I was waiting for my team-mates to embrace me, and no one came," Maradona later explained, having famously used his left hand to get the decisive touch. "I told them, 'Come and hug me or the referee isn't going to allow it.'"

Whether it was the disguised punch or enthusiastic celebration that did the trick, referee Ali Bennaceur waved away English protests as he validated one of the most controversial goals of all time. And it only increased in notoriety when the 'Pibe de Oro' (Golden Boy) announced that it had been scored "a little with the head of Maradona and a little with the hand of God".

The remark was as cheeky and memorable as the goal itself, but Maradona could afford a little impudence after his second strike just four minutes after the first, a masterpiece. This time there were no complaints – only agony and admiration. Spinning majestically in his own half, Maradona skipped past Peter Reid and Peter Beardsley and dinked his way down the right channel, turning inside Butcher and beating Terry Fenwick at pace before slipping the ball beyond the onrushing Shilton as Butcher closed in.

"It's probably the one and only time in my career that I felt like applauding the opposition scoring a goal," said Lineker, who reduced the deficit and came close to grabbing an equaliser before Argentina safely progressed. Maradona then starred again with another superb solo effort against Belgium, before seeing off some close attention to help his team dispatch West Germany 3-2 in the final.

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It was his display against England, though, that endures, with both goals seared into the collective conscience for very different reasons. Debate still rages as to whether the first was beyond the pale or the ultimate expression of South American 'viveza' (cunning), but the second has found few dissenters: "the goal of the century".

That the two strikes came in such quick succession merely added to the legend of both, and magnified the complexity of the man himself – dubbed "half-angel, half-devil" by L'Équipe. His performance that day continues to enchant and beguile.