Gianni Miná, the Italian journalist who most defended Maradona at his worst moment, has died

When true spring breaks into the Northern Hemisphere, a freezing cold sweeps through the entire American South. Gianni Miná, the most Latin American of Italian journalists, an institution in his country, has died. He would have turned 85 on May 17. Aspiring writers may take a little interest in the life and work of a singular man. It will be necessary.

To say he was a surrogate father for Diego Maradona is an exaggeration, but ever since Guillermo Blanco, then press officer for 10, introduced them months before the 1990 World Cup, Miná and Maradona had a close relationship. Miná was the national team captain’s strongest defender when Italy was preparing the ground for the World Cup and subsequent suspension for doping in 1991. It seems that Diego was the only one to whom it was given.

Miná was a journalist, writer, essayist, producer and documentary filmmaker, and a sacred word for the well-meaning. You had an unusual relationship with Latin America and Argentina in particular. Before that World Cup you did a tour that also took you to Montevideo and you interviewed old glories from Peñarol, Nacional and La Celeste.

He wasn’t the only one in 1987 he records Fidel Castro for 16 hoursfrom which a documentary was born which has since become a reference book for historians. For the first time Fidel has spoken in depth about his relationship with Che Guevara. Years later she repeated the meeting and a new book. The first was preceded by García Márquez, the second by Jorge Amado. The bearded man wasn’t the only one sitting opposite Gianni. Rigoberta Menchu, Chico Buarque, Ray Charles Nereo Roco, Platini, Muhammad Alí, Ronaldo and Carlos Monzón also passed before Miná’s questions completed the broad picture of politics and entertainment.

He wrote for La Repubblica, L’Unità, Corriere de la Sera, Il Manifesto, long after his debut as a reporter at the Tuttosport sports club in Turin, his hometown. He was the man of the famous Domenica Sportiva, a fan of Turin, he toured all of Latin America making political, social and sporting documentaries. He has received all possible awards for his journalistic work.

And a day like today, he’s gone. He didn’t wait for the European spring. Just him, who was a bright and fragrant flower in a journalism that doesn’t know what winters it’s facing.