Player refuses to observe minute’s silence for Maradona

A SPANISH football player, 24, refused to observe a minute’s silence for Maradona at a match yesterday, Sunday, November 29.

The 24-year-old player for women’s football team Viajes Interrias FF, Paula Dapena, sat on the ground and turned away during the tribute which took place before a friendly match against Deportivo de la Coruña, saying that she refused to do so for a “rapist and abuser”.

Diego Armando Maradona died last Wednesday of a heart attack, on the day which marks the International Day Against Gender Violence, and Dapena said she believed that tributes should have been paid to the victims, not for someone who behaved in such an abusive way towards women. “If a minute’s silence was not observed for the victims, I am not willing to do it for an abuser”, she said, also calling him a “paedophile” and a “womaniser”.

She added “to be a player you have to be a person first and have values ​​beyond skills like those he had”, admitting to his “spectacular” talent for football, but justifying her refusal to observe a minute’s silence for Maradona.

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