After the draw was made in December in Cape Town, Argentina coach Diego Maradona was invited to cast his mind back to when the two teams met at the 1986 World Cup. Then, the world’s greatest player was given a little rough treatment by the Koreans and especially their hard-running and hard-tackling midfielder Huh Jung-moo, who is now the coach of the East Asians.

"I remember Huh very well," Maradona said. "In 1986 the Koreans played Tae Kwon Do, not football, against us."

In the official pre-match press conference Huh was asked about the comments. “If we are to compare ourselves as players, he was a world class player and I respected him then and now,” he said. “There were physical tussles and that is natural. He was a great player and it was difficult to mark him, so we probably got a bit physical because of that, but it was not malicious.”

Maradona rounded on Pelé, who has been quoted as saying that Maradona took the Argentina job only because he needed the money. He said that Pelé should "go back to the museum" and claimed that Platini, the Uefa president, thinks he "is better than all the rest".

Maradona also criticised Platini over reported negative comments by the Frenchman about the 1986 World Cup winner's coaching ability: "Platini? I'm not surprised, I've always had a very distant relationship with him, it's always just hello and goodbye, nothing more than that.

"We all know how the French are, and Platini is French, and he believes he is better than rest."

The Jabulani ball also came under Maradona's scrutiny after questions about the dearth of goals and lack of excitement in the World Cup so far.

"I'm having a wonderful time, to me a World Cup is something that's quite amazing. I'm not worried by the fact there aren't many goals, I'm sure there will be goals, I'm sure the players will see to that," he said .

"Of course in the first matches you are more careful, perhaps more careful than you should be.

"And, of course, there's the ball. I don't want to go into the ball again because everyone is talking about it, but it is important and it does play a part and I would ask Pelé and Platini to go out there and play with the ball and take a closer look at it to see if it's a good one or bad one, and to stop talking rubbish about me."

“I was disappointed with Pele, he’s a two-bob opportunist...”

“I care nothing for Platini. I have a French teammate friend (Zinedine Zidane) who has surpassed everything he ever did and he has always told me that Platini is jealous...”

“At the World Cup, I will make a lot of people eat their words.”