Boca v River: the Libertadores final South America has waited 58 years for
Bitter Argentinian rivals are up against each other over two legs but no away fans will be allowed – it is simply too dangerous
Fri 9 Nov 2018 00.01 GMT
Pepper spray in the tunnel, an inflatable pig floated in front of the away fans, Carlos Tévez being sent off for performing a chicken dance … take your pick: the
superclásico has an almost inexhaustible store of anecdote, ranging from the bizarre to the tragic, the wackiness of the image often disguising the menace that lies beneath.
Boca Juniors against River Plate is one of the world’s great derbies, maybe the greatest, and there is perhaps something appropriate about the fact that the last two-leg final of the Copa Libertadores will see these two most celebrated of rivals go head to head.
The stadiums, themselves shabby, atmospheric, dripping with history, may only be eight miles apart, but no away fans will be allowed at either leg. Those are eight critical miles, a journey that not only takes you past the Planetarium, outside which the first football match was played on Argentinian soil by British Freemasons in 1867, but represents the distance River travelled from their origins in the same docks as Boca to leafy Núñez. They are the immigrants made good, the rivalry cast as working- against middle-class, the sweat and industry of Boca against the style and artistry of River.
The decision to ban away fans was inevitable. It was only in August that away fans began to return to Argentinian league games after a five-year ban, and then not in games involving the five
grandes. The risk is simply too great.
The incident in 2012 when River fans delayed the start of the second half of a
superclásico by floating an inflatable pig in Boca colours in front of away fans tended to be played for laughs, but it was a factor in the violence that followed as stewards were dragged to the top of the terrace and hurled down flights of stairs. (Boca are known as “
los bosteros” because of the piles of manure –
bosta – used in the brick industry that used to dominate the area where their ground now stands.)
Last time the teams met in the Libertadores, in the last 16 in 2015, the second leg had to be abandoned after pepper spray was released in the tunnel at la Bombonera, causing severe problems for River, who were subsequently awarded the game.
Tévez’s dance also came in the Libertadores, in the semi-final in 2004, the latest stage at which the sides had met in the competition until now. That was a tie that lived up to every expectation and more.
Boca won a tempestuous first leg 1-0, a game in which Marcelo Gallardo, the current River coach, was sent off along with Boca’s Raúl Alfrédo Cascini.
Boca had Fabián Vargas sent off just after half-time in the return before Lucho González levelled the tie. Rubens Sambueza was then sent off for River, a decision that provoked such anger that their coach, Leo Astrada, his assistant and the physio were dismissed. When Ricardo Rojas limped off with all three substitutes having been used, River were left to battle on with nine men.
That looked decisive when Tévez smashed in a cut-back from the left with six minutes remaining. But he was sent off after celebrating by removing his shirt and flapping his arms by his sides – a reference to River’s reputation as
gallinas, chickens, a nickname they acquired in 1966 after Banfield fans threw a live chicken on to the pitch to taunt them for losing a Libertadores final play-off against Peñarol after being 2-0 up, the latest in a string of chokes. Cristian Nasuti equalised in injury time and, away goals not being applied in those days, sent the game through extra time to penalties, which Boca won.