No one who was alive to watch England’s quarter-final in the 1966 World Cup, whether at a sunlit Wembley stadium or on black and white television, would ever forget the tall figure of Antonio Rattín, Argentina’s captain, walking slowly around the Wembley touchline, heading for the tunnel, accompanied by two uniformed policemen and his team’s trainer. It was barely half an hour into the match and Rattín, who has died aged 89, had initially refused to leave the pitch after being sent off by the West German referee, Rudolf Kreitlein.
Five players had already been booked, Rattín among them, when Kreitlein made his fateful decision. The official reason for the captain’s dismissal was said to be “violence of the tongue”, which was strange since neither man spoke each other’s language. Kreitlein was later quoted as observing that while “Rattín said nothing I could understand, I could see in his face what he was saying.” It took eight minutes to get the player off the field, an unprecedented act on an English pitch; later Rattín claimed that he had been asking for an interpreter.
