The Argentine club Atlético Boca Juniors announced on Monday that it intends to play the Spanish club Barcelona in a tribute friendly match to mark the one-year-anniversary of the death of their former player  late compatriot, the legend Diego Armando Maradona. Atlético Boca Juniors in its statement said that Riyadh will host this football event, the Maradona Cup, on Dec.14, 2021.
The capital club, Buenos Aires, revealed in its statement that "it will be the first time that the two clubs meet, as (in their ranks) Diego played, in this country in the Middle East, and it will be a way to celebrate the legacy of Maradona (fans’ lovable) who died on November 25, 2020".
Maradona Cup on Dec. 14 will be hosted at King Saud University Stadium in Riyadh, including the European side.Maradona gave the most remarkable individual performance in the history of the World Cup in Mexico in 1986. Whichever team Maradona played with, the team would win, and most of the teams that Maradona played with became distinguished and very popular.
Maradona started his football career with the Argentine Club Atletico Boca Juniors team in the 1981-82 season, before moving to FC Barcelona, where he played for two seasons until 1984. After that, he moved again to Napoli and stayed there until 1991.
He then briefly played for Sevilla and before returning to Boca Juniors, where he remained with until his retirement in 1997. It is worth noting that Maradona played an exhibition match for Al-Ahli in Jeddah in 1987, one year after winning the World Cup for Argentina in 1986.
The Maradona Cup match, which will be held for the first time, is one of the most distinctive events of Riyadh Season 2021.Football icon Diego Maradona received inadequate medical care and was left to his fate for a “prolonged, agonising period” before his death last year, an expert medical panel has concluded. The 60-year-old Argentinian succumbed to a heart attack on November 25, just weeks after undergoing brain surgery on a blood clot.