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Diego Maradona, One of Soccer’s Greatest Players, Is Dead at 60

Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Diego Maradona, the Argentine who became one of soccer’s greatest players with a roguish cunning and extravagant control while pursuing a personal life rife with drug and alcohol abuse and health problems, died on Wednesday in Tigre, Argentina, in Buenos Aires Province. He was 60.

His spokesman, Sebastián Sanchi, said the cause was a heart attack. Maradona’s death came several weeks after he underwent brain surgery for a subdural hematoma, bleeding that collects in tissues surrounding the brain and can be caused by a head injury.

The news of the death caused an immediate commotion in Argentina, becoming virtually the sole topic of conversation.