‘With Maradona around we’d have won USA 94. We lost our lighthouse, our leader - we struggled to change our mentality, to play as a team without him’ How Diego Maradona’s drug ban cost them another World Cup victory

Diego Maradona celebrates passionately after scoring for Argentina against Greece at the 1994 World Cup.

It was perhaps the most iconic image of the 1994 World Cup in the USA.

A wide-eyed Diego Maradona, crackling with intensity, ran to the nearest television camera and screamed with joy after he netted a brilliant group stage goal against Greece.

That would prove to be his final goal in an Argentina shirt, as the South American icon would fail a drugs test after his side’s following match against Nigeria and never play for his country again.

How Maradona's absence cost Argentina at USA 94

The match against Nigeria was Maradona's final international appearance (Image credit: Alessandro Sabattini/Getty Images)

Maradona’s side went to USA as one of the favourites to win the tournament after having lifted the trophy in 1986 and lost in the final to West Germany four years later.

But after their talisman and captain was banned, Argentina would lose their final group game to Bulgaria, before being dumped out of the competition in the last-16 stage by a Gheorghe Hagi-inspired Romania.

Roberto Sensini won 60 caps for Argentina (Image credit: Getty Images)

And one of Maradona’s team-mates in that team, Roberto Sensini, was in no doubt as to just how costly the absence of his skipper, who ranked at no.3 in FourFourTwo’s list of the greatest players of all-time, was.

“Maradona was just different from normal people,” Sensini tells FourFourTwo. “He could do everything – things that we couldn’t even imagine. He had incredible ease with his left foot and will always have his place in history.

“I think we might have won the 1994 World Cup had he not been banned. It was another sensational side.

“We talked earlier about the regret of not having won Serie A at Parma – with that World Cup, the regret is perhaps even greater. The squad was brilliant: we also had Fernando Redondo, Diego Simeone and Gabriel Batistuta… a team of names, certainly superior to many other countries.

Maradona had led Argentina to the World Cup in 1986

“But after Diego’s disqualification, we lost our lighthouse, our leader. We were unable to change our mentality, to play as a team without him. I think that with Maradona around we would have won it.”

Instead, Argentina were left to watch neighbours Brazil lift the trophy for a fourth time when they defeated Italy on penalties at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, with La Albiceleste having to wait until 2022 for their next World Cup win.