Julio Grondona is a powerful, divisive figure in global football who will take a front row seat at Sunday’s World Cup final as the long time head of the Argentine Football Association.
He will no doubt see a victory over Germany as another crowning achievement in a four-decade rule over Argentinian football during which he has never strayed far from controversy.
The 83-year-old has been repeatedly linked to scandals, but shrugs off criticism and has been easily re-elected as AFA president every four years since 1979.
Grondona lists “sports management” as one of his hobbies on his FIFA biography.
But as a senior vice-president of the world governing body and head of its key finance committee, he has full time implication in FIFA’s multi-billion dollar empire.
With Argentina in the grip of a military dictatorship that ruled from 1976 to 1983, Grondona was named AFA head by Vice Admiral Carlos Lacoste who headed the organizing committee of the World Cup staged in the country and triumphantly won by the home side in 1978.
He has survived since through democratically elected governments of all shades. All have been forced to negotiate with ‘Don Julio’ who enjoys the massive and unconditional support of a football network based on the 22,000 clubs.
Grondona has in turn reformed the country’s football to maintain its powerhouse status. The Albiceleste won the World Cup again in 1986 against West Germany, the Olympics gold medal in Athens in 2004 and Beijing in 2008 as well as the Copa America in 1991 and 1993.