Fabian O'Neill, a former Uruguayan international footballer, died on Sunday at the age of 49.
He died in a hospital in Monteviedo, following cirrhosis.
"He's the most talented player I've ever seen," said Zinedine Zidane of his former team-mate at Juventus Turin during the 2000-2001 season.
Uruguayan football found itself in mourning on Christmas Day.
Former international midfielder Fabian O'Neill died on Sunday at the age of 49 following cirrhosis.
It was his first professional club (where he played from 1992 to 1995), the Nacional Montevideo, which announced the sad news by tweeting: “Goodbye magician!
".
Hoy llora la camiseta 10.
Hoy holds the magic para recordar a Fabian O'Neill, one of los jugadores that despertó más admiration con la camiseta de Nacional.
Se fue uno de los nuestros.
Hasta siempre Mago.
👉🏼 https://t.co/P9LsMMAfGx pic.twitter.com/U4UgC66AZu
— National (@Nacional) December 25, 2022
Access to this content has been blocked to respect your choice of consent
By clicking on "
I ACCEPT
", you accept the deposit of cookies by external services and will thus have access to the content of our partners
I ACCEPT
And to better remunerate 20 Minutes, do not hesitate to accept all cookies, even for one day only, via our "I accept for today" button in the banner below.
More information on the Cookie Management Policy page.
Fabian O'Neill retired from sport in 2003, aged just 30.
He then encountered problems with alcoholism and had been hospitalized since Saturday for a hemorrhage in a hospital in Montevideo, where he died on Sunday.
"He's the most talented player I've ever seen," praised Zinedine Zidane a few years ago, about his ex-teammate at Juventus Turin, during the 2000-2001 season.
“I had 14 million dollars and I lost everything”
Fabian O'Neill had also played in Cagliari and Perugia in Italy, before returning to the Nacional to finish his career there in 2003. He had also participated shortly before with the Uruguayan selection at the 2002 World Cup, but he did not was unable to play a single game due to injury.
In 2017,
So Foot
said that the person concerned had one day participated in a cow auction, during which, severely alcoholic, he had gone so far as to acquire 1,104 cattle, for the modest sum of 250,000 dollars.
Ruined at the end of his career, Fabian O'Neill confided with philosophy: “I had 14 million dollars and I lost everything.
I had tons of friends and today I live with a dozen vagabonds like me, we help each other.
But I don't mind being poor, I never wanted to be on the side of the rich.
I have enough to buy myself a drink.
Eating, I can eat rice with eggs, it's the same.
Slow horses, fast women and lots of bets, that's why I have nothing left.
La Celeste has lost her own George Best.
Sport
France team: Noël Le Graët will meet Didier Deschamps next week to discuss his future
Sport
World Cup 2022: "When you lose, you owe explanations", Dugarry charges Deschamps
Soccer
Uruguay
Juventus Torino
Zinedine Zidane
Sport