Argentina has produced some of the greatest footballers the world has ever known, and throughout the decades, the country has put some incredible national team sides on the park. These have gone on to be regarded as some of the greatest teams of all time, but despite being one of the best sides Argentina has ever produced, the Angels With Dirty Faces are mostly unknown, or at the very least forgotten, outside of the South American nation. The side that won the 1954 South American Championship up until the events at the 1966 World Cup featured what is arguably Argentina’s best ever forward line. And that includes the ones featuring the likes of Messi and Maradona that came to the fore in later years. In addition, this forward line lacked many of Argentina’s talented exiles, who escaped to Colombia and Europe following the players strike of 1949. Without them, Argentina had to churn out a new generation of footballers and three in particular rose from the streets of Buenos Aires to lead the Albiceleste through a highly successful era in which they took the South American Championships by storm.

 

Humberto Maschio, Omar Sivori and Antonio Angellilo were known as “Los Carasucias” aka The Angels with Dirty Faces, after the classic James Cagney gangster movie of the same name due to their heavy Latin American features and the fact that they played with a gangster-like swagger, attitude and flair. In addition, they resembled actors from the film: Maschio and Angellilo were doppelgangers of Humphrey Bogart and George Bancroft respectively, Sivori looked a bit like Billy Halop and Oreste Corbatta resembled Cagney. In 1955, the team crossed the border into Chile to compete for the South American Championships. Micheli and Borello scored all the goals in a 5-3 defeat of Paraguay and they toppled Ecuador 4-0 before being held to a draw with Peru. But Argentina returned to form with a 6-1 belting of traditional rivals Uruguay before edging out the hosts 1-0 to become champions of South America.

 

But it’s the 1957 edition of the tournament in which Los Carasucias made their mark. In Peru, Colombia suffered an 8-2 destruction at the hands of Argentina’s forward line, who then defeated Ecuador 3-0. By the time Uruguay found themselves on the wrong end of a 4-0 pasting, the trio of Maschio, Angellilo and Sivori had harvested 11 goals in the space of a week. A 6-2 win over Chile was capped off with a 3-0 victory over the mighty Brazil to win the championship again. It’s prudent to know that in this tournament, Brazil beat Chile 4-2, Ecuador 7-1 and Colombia 9-0! To suffer a defeat to Argentina after results like these is testament to the quality of the Albiceleste at the time. The previous three meetings between the Argentines and the Brazilians were tight affairs, and the same result was expected, but instead the Angels delivered a footballing masterclass. Osvaldo Cruz’s performance against his marker Djalma Santos, one of the best defenders in history, was so good that the latter convinced his club Palmeiras to sign the player.

 

After this outstanding achievement, the Angels heard the old country calling them. Throughout the history of the game, Italian and Argentinian football has been intrinsically linked, with many Argentinians of Italian heritage being lured by the Lira and moving to Europe to ply their trade in the Serie A or even represent the Italian national team. For Maschio, Angellilo and Sivori, this would be no different and all three would go on to have glittering careers in Italy’s top flight. Sivori, the most celebrated of the three, signed with Juventus where he joined John Charles and Giampiero Boniperti to become part of another famous trio. Angellilo moved to Inter Milan and there, he became Capacannoniere (top scorer) of the Serie A, while Maschio had a successful time at Bologna. The trio broke Argentine hearts by never playing together again, but to make matters even worse for fans of the Albiceleste, all three eventually lined up for the Italian national team, Sivori and Maschio appearing for the Azzurri at the 1962 World Cup. Crushed by loneliness due to the departure of his friends, Corbetta became an alcoholic and his career eventually imploded. The military dictatorship controlling Argentina was so outraged at Angellilo’s departure that he was banned from ever stepping foot on Argentinian soil again, and spent 20 years in exile from his own country. At the end of the day, the trio were talented and entertaining footballers who, in the same manner as the mercenary-like stars of today, jumped at the opportunity for higher wages and a better life in an era when being a footballer wasn’t the most lucrative career path.

 

After a 24 year absence, Argentina returned to the World Cup in 1958, but, as they were banned from playing for Argentina, Guillermo Stabile could not select Silvori, Maschio or Angellilo, who were by now playing in the Serie A, for the squad. The team still contained excellent players, but their lack of experience against European opposition quickly became evident. For Argentina, the 1958 World Cup became known as the Swedish Disaster after they were beaten 3-1 by West Germany, just narrowly defeated Northern Ireland and were then absolutely thrashed by Czechoslovakia 6-1, the worst defeat in the teams history. On their return home, 10,000 people met the team at the Buenos Aires airport simply to hurl insults at them. After this disaster, Argentina gained some retribution by winning the 1959 South American Championship with an undefeated run, but they would not win the competition again until 1991.

 

In 1960, they won their only Panamerican Championship and in 1961 they decided to obtain more experience against European teams and went on a tour of the continent in which they only yielded 1 win, with 2 losses and 2 draws. In 1964, the Brazilian football association celebrated its 50th Anniversary by organising the Nations Cup. Looked upon as a “little World Cup”, it featured the host nation along with Argentina, England and Portugal. Argentina won all of their games without conceding a single goal to win the tournament, gaining particular praise for their win over Brazil who had not been beaten at home since the 1950 World Cup final. They qualified for the 1966 World Cup, going through their qualification campaign unbeaten and playing friendlies against the Soviet Union, Poland and Italy in preparation. They defeated Spain 2-1 in their opener, had a goalless draw against West Germany and edged out Switzerland 2-1 to reach the quarter final against hosts England. This was one of the most controversial games of all time, with Antonio Rattin sent off for swearing despite the fact that the German referee spoke no Spanish. Rattin was so disgusted that in protest, he sat on the red carpet that was exclusively for the Queen of England to walk on. Rattin was carted away by two policemen but not before he scrunched up an England flag. It’s this incident that sparked the long standing rivalry between Argentina and England that burns to this day, and also led to FIFA’s decision to introduce the yellow and red card to the game. Rattin’s actions had the effect of gaining the respect of Argentina’s fans and they received a good reception on their return home, despite another disappointing World Cup.

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Achievements: 
South American Championship – Winners x3
Panamerican Championship – Winners x1
Copa Newton – Winners x1
Copa Lipton – Winners x1
Nations Cup – Winners x1

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Star player: Omar Sivori, dob 2 October 1935, pob San Nicolas, Argentina, nickname: El Cabezon (Big Head)

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Sivori’s home town of San Nicolas is today a part of Buenos Aires, and it was here that he was born into an Italian Argentine family. Sivori is considered one of the greatest players of his generation, as well as one of Juventus’ and Italy’s best ever. He was quick, creative, and technically brilliant, with outstanding dribbling skills, sensational flair, and an arsenal of tricks for beating defenders including feints, flicks, turns, directional changes and his personal trademark, the nutmeg which involves passing the ball between an opponents legs and retrieving it on the other side. In addition, he was a clinical finisher with a powerful and accurate left footed shot from inside and outside the box. He was a great header of the ball too, but his short stature meant that he would often get kicked in the face when attempting this. Sivori was tenacious and brave, but was sometimes volatile and unsportsman-like, arguing with officials, committing aggressive tackles and attempting to provoke or humiliate opponents, sometimes using his ball skills to do so. He was also a creator of chances, and his hairstyle, strong mentality, talent and rebellious nature has drawn comparisons with another great Argentine player who came after him – Diego Maradona. As such, Sivori has been called “The Maradona of the sixties”. He became interested in football from a young age and by the time he was in his teens, Sivori was signed the River Plate side that featured such stars as Angel Labruna and Felix Losteau. Sivori’s nickname came from his boofy hair, outspokenness, cockiness, arrogance and confident playing style. With River, Sivori won the Argentine league title in 1955 and again in 1956, on the last day of the season, with Sivori scoring the final goal. For the Argentina national team, Sivori comprised part of the strike force known as the Angels With Dirty Faces helping them to win the 1957 South American Championship. That year, Sivori was signed by Juventus for 10 million pesos (£91,000), a world record transfer fee at the time. With the money from the deal, River Plate added a forth stand to El Monumental which bore his name. At the same time, Sivoris compatriots Angellilo and Maschio also joined the Serie A and the trio became known as the Trio of Death within the league due to the fearless playing style and clinical finishing. With Sivori a part of a deadly trio within Juventus, the club won the 1957/58 Serie A title and they collected two more plus 2 Coppa Italia titles in the late 1950’s. As a result of all this hard work, Sivori was awarded the coveted European Player of the Year award in 1961. His attacking partners, Boniperti retired and Charles moved back to Leeds United, leaving Sivori as the last member of the deadly Juventus trio. He stayed on and scored the only goal in a game against Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernebeau, making Juventus the only Italian side to ever win there. He was appointed to captain of Juventus in 1963, but left in 1965 following disagreements with the mananger. Sivori remains the clubs fifth highest goalscorer and he also holds the record for most goals scored in a Serie A match, finding the back of the net 6 times in a 9-1 thrashing of Inter Milan in June 1961. That year, he also made his debut for the Italian national team at the 1962 FIFA World Cup, however Italy were eliminated in the opening round. Sivori signed with Napoli thar year, helping them finish third in the league and win the Coppa Delle Alpi in his first season. In 1967 the side was boosted by the arrivals of Dino Zoff and Jose Altafini and they were favoraites to win the league. They battled AC Milan for supremacy all season, but eventually finished second. Had Sivori notbeen ruled out for much of the season with a knee injury, things could have been different. In his last ever match in the Serie A, ironically against Juventus, Sivori was sent off for kicking an opponent. It was then that he decided to return to Argentina to become a coach. Even though by now he was a rich man, Sivori loved the game and to stay involved, he managed River Plate, Rosario Central, Estudiantes, Racing and Velez Sarsfield. Sivori was named in 2004 as one of Pele’s top 125 living footballers, but he died from pancreatic cancer the following year, in his hometown of San Nicolas.