On May 6, the Argentine Football Federation officially released news that the famous coach Luis Menotti died at the age of 85. Menotti is arguably the godfather of Argentine football, leading Argentina to their first World Cup title in 1978 and witnessing Argentina again in 2022 as a director.
"It is with a heavy heart that the Argentine Football Federation announces that the director of the national team and former World Cup-winning coach César Luis Menotti has passed away and farewell, dear Flaco," the Argentine Football Federation officially wrote. ”
Argentine football has been able to become a powerhouse in world football over the past few decades, and Menotti has definitely contributed to it. After the 1974 World Cup in Germany, the Argentine Football Federation decided to hire Menotti to coach the team in preparation for the World Cup to be played on home soil four years later.
In the 1978 World Cup in Argentina, Menotti was a blockbuster and led the team to win the World Cup for the first time, and Menotti was not even 40 years old at the time, he became the youngest champion coach in the history of the World Cup, a record that no one has been able to break so far.
A year after winning the World Cup, Menotti led Argentina's youth team to the World Youth Championship, where Menotti's team conquered the world with attacking football and a flashy style of play, with the team's number one star at the time, young Diego Maradona.
After leaving the Argentine national team, Menotti turned his focus to the club, where he coached teams such as Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Boca Juniors, River Plate, Peñarol and Rosario Central. Between 1991 and 1992, he briefly coached the Mexican national team.
After Scaloni became the coach of the Argentine national team, Menotti gave him the greatest support and took up the role of team director himself. In 2022, the Argentines won the World Cup for the first time in 36 years, and Menotti contributed a lot. However, it is a little regrettable that due to physical reasons, Menotti did not travel to Qatar with the team at that time.