David Beckham's foot – broken by the Argentine defender Aldo Duscher in April – is only the latest body part to make its contribution to this intense, instinctive animosity. Diego Simeone's toe, in the 1998 World Cup, was instrumental in making Beckham lash out and be sent off. And, most famously, Diego Maradona's hand, in the 1986 quarter-final, played its disgraceful – or mythical, depending on which side you are on – part again in defeating England in the most acrimonious fashion imaginable.But those are only the tips of a much larger body of thought and feeling. Argentines remember just as well the sending-off of Rattin in the 1966 World Cup, which England went on to win – an injustice they still feel. England's manager, Alf Ramsey, forbade his team to shake hands with their opponents after the match.

Rather than deserving admiration for their sense of fair play, the English – in the story most Argentines are familiar with – are hypocrites who victimised their country for centuries.Of course, the Falklands have played an essential part in making us enemies. Weather forecasts in Argentina are given, every day on the television, for "the whole of Argentina, including Las Malvinas" – their name for the islands. Annexed in 1833 by Britain, they have been a thorn in Argentinian national pride ever since.The Falklands war of 1982 is still, 20 years after the events, a source of anger, directed at the brutal and incompetent military junta of the time, but also at Britain. Hundreds of Argentines died on the islands and in the sinking of the cruiser Belgrano.Nationalistic fervour, cynically used by Argentina's government, turned, with the defeat, into a profound sense of humiliation and bitterness.

Fresh reasons were added to the old to drive Anglophobia even deeper into the national psyche.But that is not all. If there weren't also a degree of attraction, a rivalry that comes from sneaking respect, there would probably not be so much bad blood. Britain, with its trade and even with its armies, has at times helped Argentina in its struggle to become a nation. There is a strong parallel tradition of Anglophilia in Buenos Aires.

Its most famous proponent was Borges, who claimed to have read Don Quixote in English as a boy, before reading it in Spanish, and who spoke Spanish, according to some, like an Englishman.From the English side, too, there have been lovers of Argentina and its culture. In Patagonia, Bruce Chatwin's first book, in 1979, only a few years before the conflict, selected Argentina as a mind-expanding last frontier, a country with a fascinating mixture of archaeology, social history, emigrant stories and eccentric Welsh outposts. Paul Theroux is another enthusiast.Meanwhile, sporting events are such receptacles of passionate rivalry partly because we think we know each other well, and because so far there has been a pattern, a trade-off. England has come off badly on the playing-field, but Argentina – especially now – has had the worst of it in political, economic and military terms.The English have little idea quite how important this is to the Argentines. Listening to Gary Lineker speaking last week about the infamous 1986 World Cup quarter-final between the two nations, which England lost 2-1, you could hardly have imagined a more decent, level-headed, cheerful and, well, superficial analysis of the game – at least compared with how it is seen through Argentine eyes. The key phrases were, "You have to take your hat off," and, "We felt cheated." And, of course, "the hand of God".Diego Maradona's inspired "explanation" of the unorthodox and illegal way he patted the ball past Peter Shilton to score the first of his two goals means one thing in Britain (a slippery way of not-quite-saying "I cheated") and a very different, more complex thing in Argentina.