September 4, 1989. Sporting, from Portugal, was playing at the San Paolo Stadium against Napoli, from Italy, in an eliminatory game of the EUFA League. Diego Maradona was wearing the shirt of the Italian club.
The goalless draw in the first leg in Portugal did not bring any advantage to the team that was facing one of the strongest teams in Italy. Only the score did not change in the normal time in the second match.
Therefore, the definition of the vacancy was for penalties. At that moment, Sporting goalkeeper Tomislav Ivkovic took action and ‘wrote’ a beautiful story for a lifetime.
The Croatian player told the Portuguese press what happened in October 2010. “When he (Maradona) was going to kick his penalty, I approached him and said: ‘Do you want to bet 100 dollars as I defend?’ He accepted, I defended and at the end of the game, Maradona gave me his shirt and the 100 dollars “, revealed Ivkovic.
In the end, the Italians won the penalty shootout and qualified. In other words, the beat missed by Maradona did not do so much damage for Napoli.
The ‘second bet’ against Maradona
On June 30, 1990, in Florence, Argentina and Yugoslavia fought for a spot in the semifinals of the World Cup in Italy. Again, the score did not go from 0 to 0 and the decision went to penalties pitting Ivkovic against Maradona, for the second time.
In that second encounter, the goalkeeper made the bet in a provocative tone. “At the 1990 World Cup I defended another penalty from him. I started to provoke again, saying: ‘Watch out, I know where I am going to kick …’ I missed those two games, “said Ivkovic.
Grabbing Maradona’s penalty, the Yugoslavian goalkeeper celebrated as if he had scored a goal, only that Maradona ended up celebrating much more in the end. That’s because he overcame Yugoslavia in the quarterfinals, Italy in the semifinals, but ended up losing the final to West Germany.
On that occasion, everyone at the Olympic Stadium in Rome saw “El Pibe” with tears in their faces. Now, all football fans, especially Argentines, mourn the departure of one of the greatest idols in the history of the sport.
