England enter the Azteca cathedral – football’s greatest stadium

It only adds to all of the symbolism around the Azteca that, before Pele and Diego Maradona reached a level of football that is now seen as celestial, they first had to ascend.

>The old structure of the grand stadium had the dressing rooms underground, so teams had to come and continue up a flight of stairs.

>It was so enclosed that, despite 115,000 fans raucously cheering outside, all Maradona could hear in the moments before that England game at the 1986 World Cup was “the clicking of studs on that metallic floor”.

The Azteca is a football cathedral (Reuters)“You were down below pitch level,” says Gary Stevens, the former Tottenham Hotspur star who played at the Azteca in that World Cup. “It was dark and cool, but then you stepped out into the light and the heat.”

>And the atmosphere, and the air. That doesn’t mean the notorious “lack of oxygen” as Stevens puts it. It’s the sense of history.

>For all the focus on altitude, the Azteca is also an altar, within a cathedral, whatever religious description you want. It has witnessed the Hand of God, after all.

The Hand of God might be the Azteca’s most infamous moment (Getty)The renovated 2026 Azteca now has its criticisms, and no longer features elements like the shadow from the 1986 broadcast system, but it will always be unique.

>Stadiums like the Bernabeu, Old Trafford, San Siro, Anfield and Camp Nou may have witnessed a greater number of big names and big games – at least to European sensibilities – but none have witnessed the peaks the Azteca has. It has seen the ultimate, the greatest glory in the World Cup from the greatest ever players.

>This patch of land in the south of Mexico City has seen, as Colombia manager Nestor Lorenzo enthused, “the best of Maradona and the best of Pele”. And even that is barely the half of it.

>It wasn’t just the best. It was, yes, ascension. They put themselves above anyone else in the game. Maradona won the World Cup that confirmed his singular genius, the wondrous manner of it also forming the World Cup that was more about one player than any other.

Diego Maradona’s crowning moment came at the Azteca (Hulton Archive)He led Argentina to glory at the 1986 World Cup in the iconic stadium (Getty Images)Sixteen years before that, Pele achieved a unique feat in lifting his third, and that in an orchestral manner that proclaimed him as the grand master.

>Even alongside such apogees, and occasionally driving them, are an archive of historic moments that you can just roll off like all of the elements of Carlos Alberto’s crowning goal in 1970.

>The Azteca has witnessed two of the greatest games of all time, as well as two of the greatest goals of all time.

>The stadium has a plaque for Italy’s 4-3 semi-final win over West Germany in 1970, as well as so much Maradona iconography, portraying the two different pieces of genius that were his first against England and then the immortal second.

>Out of all this, it’s almost a tragedy that the Azteca doesn’t get to host the final, and that this last-16 match between England and Mexico football team is going to be its last game.

Brazil’s iconic 1970 side created some of the Azteca’s greatest memories (Getty Images)The ultra-expensive US stadiums may be superior in every other sense, particularly the technology, but this has a spiritual value.

>If you are a lover of the game, it is Mecca. As you walk up to it, you know football history has happened here.

>The brilliant book on that 1986 quarter-final, The Match by Andres Burgo, relays how Argentina fans used to make pilgrimages just to step on the pitch. Most cried.

>A visit to the Azteca for an actual World Cup match duly feels like something of lore, or from a mythical past, that is now supposed to be unattainable; yes, the kind of thing your grandfathers and the game’s grandees spoke about.

>Even Fabio Cannavaro, one of just 22 World Cup-winning captains, spoke of how being here gave him “goosebumps”. Getting to play a fervent Mexico in their home games of home games, then, is only part of it.

The modern Azteca can be just as incredible (Getty Images)Mexico have enjoyed a substantial home advantage (Getty Images)For all the problems of the build-up, and all the justified complaints about having to perform at altitude, this is still a privilege for the England team. This is something that players dream of.

>It should inspire them, although you get the sense that Thomas Tuchel won’t be hesitant in telling them that. He has already talked of this as “maybe one of the most beautiful fixtures” you can have, while becoming quite lyrical about the memories.

>“I remember something was hanging in the centre of the Azteca… so steep the shadow was always there in the middle,” he remembers.

>“I was 13 years old and Germany played them in the final. It's an iconic stadium. I remember the coffee table book that came from it and the pictures with all these flags and stuff. Super excited to have this match. It's an iconic match to play against Mexico in Mexico.”

>Tuchel evidently believes in the spirit of it all, too, given that he’s been talking about karma from 1986.

Thomas Tuchel has spoken of his love for the Azteca (PA)Those who have played there say you can’t help but be moved by the history. Stevens said it was similar in 1986, and that was before Maradona turned the mythology into something else entirely.

>“It’s a magical place,” he says. “Just the history. I don’t know whether you feel it, and that reminds you, or whether you know it, so you then start to feel it.”

>Either way, you’re surrounded by it. The name alone conjures enough. Not even Gianni Infantino could resist.

>His own body’s tournament may have absurdly insisted that the arena temporarily becomes known as “Mexico City Stadium” due to rules on corporate branding. That is despite the fact that the Azteca is obviously not a corporate brand, but apparently qualifies because Fifa classifies it as a “pre-existing brand”.

>And yet there was Infantino before the opening, actually talking about how he was still calling it the Azteca anyway. How couldn’t you? It’s more than a name.

The 1986 World Cup saw the Azteca cement its place as one of the great world football stadiums (Hulton Archive)It’s more than all of the details that usually come in articles like this, like how it was built in 1966, the original brutalist style – decided on after a competition – intended to emulate the volcanoes surrounding the Valley of Mexico.

>It has since been refurbished on three occasions, in 1985, 1994 and 2016, but it’s more than that. You can change every brick, but you can’t change what happened here.

>It’s the 1970 World Cup final and the 1986 World Cup final. It’s Carlos Alberto’s goal and Brazil’s orchestral manoeuvres in the brightness. It’s the Hand of God and the goal of the century, alongside the match of the century.

>It’s Maradona. It’s Pele.

>It’s over 2,000 metres above sea level and, duly, a stadium above any other.

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