Diego Maradona — Two Match-Worn Number 10 Shirts, Boca and Barcelona

Two shirts worn by Diego Armando Maradona, both carrying the number 10, from the two seasons that preceded the myth: Boca Juniors 1981/82 and FC Barcelona 1983/84. What the pair documents is the trajectory rather than a single moment — the boy who became an idol at the Bombonera, and the player who left Spain for Naples carrying the weight of what he had already shown.

The Boca shirt, made by Adidas, is the home model of the 1981/82 season with the yellow band across the blue, worn through the campaign in which Maradona won his first title with the club. It shows the wear consistent with time on the pitch. The Barcelona shirt, made by Meyba, is the blaugrana home model with the polo collar of that period, worn and signed by Maradona on the number during his final season in Spain, before the transfer that would define the rest of his career.

Match-worn material from Maradona's pre-Napoli years is scarce precisely because those years predate the systematic collecting of football shirts: kit was reused, exchanged after matches and rarely preserved. Two shirts from the same player, from two clubs and two continents, one of them autographed, form a pair that is difficult to assemble a second time — museum-grade memorabilia of the most consequential number 10 in the history of the game.