Fire and Flames

River Plate, Argentinas most successful futbol club, finds itself playing this year for the first time in their history in second division. Their relegation game loss to Belgrano included some spectacular anecdotes, once again very probably unique to the Argentine futbol world.

During the away game, losing 2-0, River fans invaded the pitch…pushed, kicked, and insulted their own players. They then returned to their terrace, without being arrested, and the game continued as if nothing had happened…

After relegation became an unavoidable fact, the riots were of a scale even unusual for the standards of Argentine futbol. These videos dont necessarily do them justice, but you might get the idea…

And so it was, with Atlanta having been promoted and River relegated, that our humble neighborhood club played yesterday against the mighty River Plate…. and lost 7-1!

But at least our fans looked good….

(Thank to Sentimiento Bohemio)

The match was particularly tense because, with the return of away fans to second division matches (thanks River!), Atlanta fans and River fans had had two encounters in the past three weeks. In this one, you can see what appears to be two busses of River fans being chased by…10 Atlanta fans!!??
No vengas mas por Villa Crespo River….

Stereotypes are bad, but sometimes one just cant help it. This is my case with video/computer game prejudices. In typical Argentine fashion, I have always been of the firm conviction that computers are for working and consoles for playing, anybody who plays games on a computer is to be judged a hopeless nerd and be mocked for eternity. And if you play on a console, only futbol games are acceptable, playing (god forbid talking about) other games the equivalent of social suicide. So basically only playing FIFA is acceptable, and even then talking about it while not actually playing it, or even worse posting something about it online, constitutes a mildly serious faux pas.

But if exceptions are what make rules, then this is the mother of all of them, as FIFA12 brings with it groundbreaking news…

(Ok, so maybe this isnt the cover, but it definitely should have been!)

Brutal honesty…Ive even taken the supernerd step of learning how to download music onto the Playstation so that I can play with the songs of our fans in the background.

While on the subject of Racing, a short summary of what was the clasico this weekend…

On the field, 1-1, which was unfortunate. After Racing took the lead in the first minute, we were expecting a historic day, but it was not to be. Off the field of course, the day lent itself to all sorts of, ummm, „colourful“ anecdotes.

Racing fans arriving, with a couple of trophies as well….

Racing takes the field. Not bad, would have been much better though if the cops hadnt got wind of what was planned and „confiscated the materials“ shortly before the game. Unfortunate.

The cops try to enter the terrace to remove some smoke bombs…and quickly realize that this is not a good idea. Notice their retreat from maybe 15 Racing fans!

The Independiente scum, being the cowards they are, shot a Racing fan in the course of a confrontation before the game…

They also entertained themselves during the game by throwing huge pieces of cement from their terrace down to where the Racing fans were. This led to Racing fans trying to exit their section to storm the Independiente section. Of course, they didnt get far, as quickly another confrontation with the cops ensued. Racing fans and cops also had a confrontation before the game, during which the Cops made use of rubber bullets and horse charges.

Finally, it looks like our sour friends lost a little something…