In 1989, Diego Maradona’s two-year-old daughter tucked daisies into his socks before Napoli training, the picture became iconic all over the world; years later, Dalma recreated the scene at her birthday party

In 1989, late football legend Diego Maradona arrived for a Napoli training session with a small gift tucked into his football socks. The gift being the daisies placed there by his two-year-old daughter, Dalma. Instead of taking them out, the Argentine football star trained with the flowers still in place. A photograph of that moment would go on to become one of the best-known images of him with his daughter.At the time, Maradona was one of, if not the biggest names in world football. He had captained Argentina to victory at the 1986 FIFA World Cup and helped his club Napoli win the UEFA Cup in 1989. Yet the photograph from that training session captured a different side of the player, away from the trophies and the attention that followed him on the pitch.

As reported by Argentine news outlet Infobae, the photograph was taken in Naples before a training session. Dalma, dressed in yellow, was seen putting flowers into her father’s socks as he sat on a football and watched her. Other photographs from the same encounter showed the little girl playing with the ball and hugging her father. In another image, Maradona was running on the field with the daisies still tucked into his socks.

The photograph Dalma thought she had thrown away

An old picture of Diego and Dalma together.

The picture later became particularly important to Dalma, Maradona’s elder daughter with his former wife, Claudia Villafañe. But for a time, she did not know where the original photograph was. In 2022, Argentine outlet C5N reported Dalma’s account of what happened. She recalled that she had argued with her father and, while upset, asked her mother to throw the photograph away. She later began looking for it but could not find it. Villafañe had kept it. When Dalma asked her about the missing picture, her mother reassured her that she had not discarded it and that it was somewhere in the house. The original was eventually found.The photograph took on a different meaning after Maradona died in November 2020. According to Infobae, Dalma used the image to say goodbye to her father, sharing it as a reminder of their relationship. For fans, it showed a private moment involving a footballer remembered around the world for his achievements; for Dalma, it was a photograph from her childhood with her father.

Dalma recreated the moment at her 38th birthday party

The recreation brought the story back to the image that had linked Dalma’s childhood to her father’s life in Naples.

The photograph returned to the spotlight in April 2025, when Dalma celebrated her 38th birthday with family and friends at a party themed around her father and mother. Guests wore outfits inspired by Maradona and Villafañe. According to Ciudad Magazine, one of the evening’s memorable moments came when Dalma recreated the 1989 scene. She knelt in front of a friend dressed in Napoli football gear and placed daisies in his socks, just as she had done with her father more than three decades earlier.The recreation brought the story back to the image that had linked Dalma’s childhood to her father’s life in Naples. In the original photograph, Maradona was preparing for training during a period when he was at the peak of his fame. The flowers were a small gesture from a toddler, but he left them in his socks as he went onto the field. More than three decades later, Dalma returned to that same gesture at her birthday celebration.