Is Maradona The Worst Coach Ever?

Life is full of paradoxes. I am putting down two sentences one after the other below and many of you would not disagree with either. However once you accept both, you will realize just what a huge paradox it is.

1. Diego Maradona is the best football player ever.

2. Diego Maradona is the worst football coach ever.

If you are an Argentina fan and happened to see last night's WC 2010 qualifier against Brazil, you would perhaps be in no mood to talk to people right now. What can be possibly said about the performance? Insipid, unimaginative, no team work and horribly careless are what comes to mind immediately but the English language is not short of words for sure.

Believe it or not - Brazil didn't play great yesterday. They had very few attacks. Yet in those attacks their team work and clinical play made all the difference. More importantly their defense had negligible trouble dealing with the few uninspiring attacks that Argentina managed.

Whenever Messi did manage to race with the ball and dribble past one or two, the ball he placed had no recipient. It's as if the players of this team had no idea how to play with each other. Argentina's only goal came as a result of a good long shot by Datolo which is understandable because their penalty box play was as poor as you can possibly imagine.

So what really is going wrong. First and foremost every single football fan on earth would tell you that the team has an absolute disgrace of a coach. The best way to describe Maradona that I can think of is that he makes Raymond Domenech appear good. Quite obviously the first step is to fire Maradona. As an ex-Argentine legend said, Maradona is clueless about what's happening with his team and how they are playing. Or a person at a senior position at River Plate asked whether Maradona has the physical and mental well being to be the national team coach. Contrary to what's being written, I don't think there will be huge problems in qualifying and the reason is that all other competitors seem to be slipping up as well. So whoever is the coach Argentina will qualify. What's important is that we need a coach who can build a team so that our eyes don't have to witness the horror show that we witnessed yesterday.

So even if that is done, are there any other problems. Well, you will read here and there that Argentina has the most talented group of players. I tend to disagree. Talented group of players does not mean attackers only. No doubt that the forwards an an embarrassment of riches. However take a look at the other positions.

As far as goal keeper goes Spain have Casillas, Italy have Buffon, Brazil have Julio Cesar and Argentina have a player who plays for Catania.

Now let's move to the defense. For left back we use Heinze. Perhaps we don't have a half way decent one around. For right back Javier Zanetti is an unquestionable legend but imagine if Argentina had a young prospect like Maicon or Dani Alves, would Zanetti be playing in the first 11? Brazil have both and so unfortunately a player like Dani Alves sits on the bench - he should have been born in Argentina. Now as far as the central defenders are concerned, the only world class one is Walter Samuel who is injured most of the time, yet to regain his best form and never chosen by Maradona. There are many alternatives but as yet no one has been able to piece out the best central defensive pairing and the immediate substitutes - scary considering how close the world cup is.

Moving on to the midfield, Mascherano is a great player but is he really so good as to be able to carry the entire team on his own shoulders. As yet I have seen nothing to believe that. And an equally good and some would say even better Cambiasso is criminally neglected. The biggest question is who should be the main attacking midfielder. We really need to see this in great detail. Before Maradona came it used to be Riquelme - a fine passer, an exquisite visionary, a player who carried the team on his own shoulders but who failed in the really big matches - made the team too dependent on him, decreased the tempo of the team's play and was marked out of the game by tactically strong opposition such as Brazil. So what does Maradona do - he brings Veron. While Riquelme often produced the brilliant, Veron hardly ever produces anything that can be construed as out of the ordinary. Okay he is South American club football's number one star but that kind of slow game could be eaten up by smart European teams. Besides we all know where the best South American players play. My conclusion is simple. He is 34 years old. And you play such a pivotal role in a top class national team when you are 34 years old only if you are Zinedine Zidane - otherwise not. Other alternatives have been suggested such as Lucho Gonzalez. This and others are worth a try but where is the time. One final suggestion that has been made is to move Messi into midfield as a playmaker. It's not a bad idea but to be fair to Messi, he should be given enough matches to adjust himself to such a role. The supporting midfielders must be decided carefully. Datolo is definitely pushing for a place. Maxi will work in some systems but not in some.

Now let's look at the forwards which is where Argentina really is the world's best but only on paper. The entire selection needs an overhaul. Higuain must be in the squad. Zarate must be considered. The positions of Tevez and Lavezzi need to be scrutinized to decide whether they merit a place in the squad. Perhaps Tevez can be in the squad but he is certainly not a starter looking at his current form and the options available. If Messi does play deeper and we can select two forwards they must be Milito/Lisandro and Aguero/Higuain.

The problem is even if Maradona were to get sacked immediately, do we have the time and the right individuals needed to get things back on track. When was the last time an Argentine international coached a top level European club successfully? For some reason Argentina have a dearth of top class coaches. Brazil suffer from no such problem. Maybe we seriously need to consider hiring foreigners. An outrageous idea that came to me was that if Guardiola were to choose not to continue with Barcelona, he should be offered the Argentina job. Please note that this is only an outrageous idea and I am not seriously suggesting it. This little bit of humor was needed to conclude the analysis about what is essentially a very depressing scenario.