Jorge Cyterszpiler, Maradona’s former agent, commits suicide
Businessman, aged 58, was reportedly being treated for depression after marital breakup
Jorge Horacio Cyterszpiler, the man who launched the career of Diego Maradona as the Argentinean soccer star’s first agent, signing him to Barcelona and Napoli in the 1980s, died on Sunday after throwing himself from the seventh floor of a hotel in Buenos Aires, according to local media reports.
Argentina’s official Télam news agency, citing police sources, said on Monday that Cyterszpiler, aged 58, had managed to evade a therapist assigned to him by doctors treating a severe depression brought on by his recent separation from his wife.
The businessman met Maradona, two years his junior, in 1970, when the Argentinean international was playing in a schoolboy side called Los Cebollitas. The two became friends and in 1977, Maradona asked him to be his agent.
During his eight years as Maradona’s manager, Cyterszpiler negotiated his transfer to Boca Juniors in 1981, and from there a year later to Barcelona. Two years after that he arranged for Maradona to join Napoli.
Cyterszpiler also set up Maradona Productions, signing lucrative advertising and sponsorship contracts.
He continued to work as an agent after he and Maradona parted company. In recent years he worked with players such as Federico Mancuello, Luciano Vietto, Martín Demichelis, Mariano Andújar and Guido Pizarro.
English version by Nick Lyne.
