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Boca's Libertadores game postponed after Maradona's death

Associated Press
·1-min read
Diego Maradona blows a kiss to fans in Cannes, France, on May 20, 2008. Diego Maradona has died. The Argentine soccer great was among the best players ever and who led his country to the 1986 World Cup title before later struggling with cocaine use and obesity. He was 60. (Gian Mattia D'Alberto/LaPresse via AP)

SAO PAULO (AP) — The Copa Libertadores game between Diego Maradona's former club Boca Juniors and Brazil’s Internacional was postponed Wednesday after the death of the Argentina great.

South America's governing soccer body CONMEBOL said the decision was made because of Maradona's “close connection with the Argentine club.”

Maradona played for Boca between 1981-82 and returned in 1995 to see out the last years of his career there.

The first leg of the round-of-16 game in Porto Alegre, in Southern Brazil, will instead be played on Dec. 2.

Maradona’s spokesman, Sebastián Sanchi, said the former World Cup winner died Wednesday of a heart attack, two weeks after being released from a hospital in Buenos Aires following brain surgery.

CONMEBOL president Alejandro Dominguez said on social media that Maradona's achievements “will live forever in our memory.”

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