Diego Maradona’s Golden Ball trophy, which was declared stolen and awarded for his performance as the best player at the 1986 World Cup, has been recovered and is set to be auctioned in France on June 6.
The Aguttes auction house revealed on Tuesday that the trophy has been found and they anticipate it will sell for “millions.”
Maradona, who passed away in 2020, received the award following his pivotal role in leading Argentina to victory at the World Cup in Mexico.
“There are a lot of stories and legends, like it was stolen by the mafia to make gold,” the Aguttes auction house sport expert Francois Thierry told BBC Sport. “We did all the necessary checks and called the police about it.
“We have had the ball for about one year. We did a lot of research about it since there are a lot of details in terms of manufacturer comments until we could say it was a good one.”
The Golden Ball was bought by the anonymous seller in 2016 at an auction in France. However, he was unaware what item he had purchased.
“He bought it with many other things, at the beginning he did not know it was something important,” Thierry added.
“In the case he bought there were a lot of trophies. He then searched on the internet and found it could be the Golden Ball.
“He tried to call Maradona and Fifa, but had no luck.”
The 1986 World Cup is perhaps most famously remembered for Diego Maradona’s two iconic goals against England in the quarter-finals.
In his first goal, Maradona leaped higher than England goalkeeper Peter Shilton and used his fist to punch the ball into the net, a move he famously dubbed the “Hand of God.”
His second goal, where Maradona dribbled from his own half past five English players to score, was later voted the “Goal of the Century” in a FIFA poll.
Both the jersey he wore during that match and the ball used have been auctioned off for millions in the past.
“The trophy symbolizes the pinnacle of his career and he is the player of the century,” Thierry said.
“We can see there were some results from before when his jersey against England in 1986 being sold for I think £9m and the ball of the game went for £2m, so we expect millions.”