<img style="float: left;" title="Kashinath Bhattacharjee" src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/2014/aug/Bhattacharjee2806.jpg" alt="Kashinath Bhattacharjee" />A famous victory and an infamous murder. Two incidents that have made, and marred Colombian football history like nothing else.
The first one: a 5-0 win over Argentina in Buenos Aires in 1993 World Cup qualifiers, following which even Pele was of the opinion that the Carlos Valderrama-led side would be one of the favourites to win the 1994 World Cup.
The second one was the murder of Andres Escober, a defender who had committed the &lsquo;crime&rsquo; of scoring an own goal against the USA, the hosts of the 1994 World Cup, in their group match which virtually ended the Los Cafeteros&rsquo; hopes of progressing to the knockouts. The assassin, Humberto Castro Munoz, after a midnight brawl outside a pub in Medellin, shot him six times on July 2, 1994.
<img title="Andres Escobar" src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/2014/aug/Escobar2806.jpg" alt="Andres Escobar" /> Andres Escobar
The tournament was still in progress. A stunned football world mourned the death of the defender with 120,000 people attending his funeral. When he came back to Colombia after the team&rsquo;s disastrous performance in the tournament, he wrote in an editorial in a Bogota Newspaper El Tiempo, signing off with the line: &ldquo;See you soon, because life does not end here.&rdquo;
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If only he would have known what had been awaiting him a few days later.

FIFA World Cup: In Suarez and Falcao's absence, Cavani and Rodriguez assume centrestage

A famous victory and an infamous murder. Two incidents that have made, and marred Colombian football history like nothing else.

FIFA World Cup: The two extremes of Colombian football

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FIFA World Cup: The two extremes of Colombian football

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