Loss of two heroes like this is cruel
LIKE many others of my generation, I remember Paolo Rossi, who died after a long illness last week, for the hat-trick that dumped Brazil out of the 1982 World Cup in one of the greatest games of football there has ever been.
I was 16 so I hated him for a few days because that Brazil side of Zico and Eder and Socrates represented everything that was beautiful for me. But by the end of the tournament, I was willing him and his team on to beat West Germany in the final.
Every generation goes through a period when it has to start mourning its heroes but to lose Diego Maradona and Rossi in such a short space of time feels especially cruel.