Why "France Football" publishes a collector's issue with an exclusive interview with Maradona

On the occasion of Diego Maradona's 60th birthday,

magazine is

releasing an exceptional collector's issue on Wednesday, in tabloid magazine format, at a price of 4.50 euros and available for three weeks.

The weekly, traditionally on newsstands on Tuesday, goes out of its way to offer an exclusive interview with Argentine number 10.

The first granted in 25 years to a French magazine, and it was already at

at the time.

A rare interview with a football legend who continues to fascinate. 

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"He will be 60 this Friday but Maradona does not need a special occasion to interest or to justify a number. When you love football, you are interested in Maradona and our readers quite regularly ask us for topics on him, "says Pascal Ferré, editor-in-chief of

.

"He is one of the craziest, most iconic, most universal characters in contemporary football. Maradonas, we are not ready to see them again. These are all the reasons why he has passed through the generations, the eras and that in 2020, more than thirty years after having given up his career, he fascinates and interests football fans, but also all others "

A $ 100,000 interview, then zero

The word of El Pibe de Oro was not easy to collect, because the former Argentina international is used to charging for his talks.

At the start of negotiations, the player claimed $ 100,000 for an interview.

Out of the question to pay for the editorial staff of

who had to be patient.

Eventually the check went from $ 100,000 to ... zero. 

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"For that, we had to cunning, discuss, convince. And on arrival, it was his ex-wife who showed up with her phone and passed it to Diego Maradona", says Pascal Ferré.

"He has a real attachment to

, it seems to me, and assured us that for his 60th birthday, he had a big pile of interviews from all over the world and that the only one he would accept would be ours. We are not yet in a position to verify it but it made us relatively happy. "