Killing Maradona : How cocaine, the Camorra, cartels and crime corrupted football's greatest talent

Author: Arrowsmith, David

Biography: sport

Published on 21 May 2026 by Octopus Publishing Group (Cassell) in the United Kingdom.

Hardback | 336 pages
240 x 165 x 33 | 560g

Drugs, cartels, mafia, addiction, the FBI, and coercion - this is the untold story behind the tragic decline of football's most gifted and controversial legend.

Maradona was football's ultimate genius - a magician on the pitch whose talent rivalled only Pelé. But off the field, the boy from the barrios of Buenos Aires became entangled in a dark web of criminal influence and personal demons. From the Cali Cartel's attempts to lure him into the drug trade, to the Camorra's grip on his life in Naples; from clashes with the Italian government to Pablo Escobar's sinister hospitality, Maradona's life was a battleground far beyond football.

Battling addiction, betrayal, and exploitation, Maradona's story is one of genius corrupted - a man caught between adulation and self-destruction, whose medical neglect and FBI scrutiny culminated in a tragic end. Marking the 40th anniversary of Argentina's legendary 1986 World Cup victory, Killing Maradona is a searing investigation into the forces that destroyed football's first 'Golden Boy.'