Futbol, Like a Religion, But With More Corner Kicks

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The Dark Side:
According to a student of mine, who I consider to be a fairly reliable source, sometime ago there was a boxing match between two Argentine boxers, one of whom was a fan of the Boca Juniors football club while the other was a fan of Chacarita, a team from a lower level. Fans from the gangs associated with both teams showed up at the match to support their man, and when at the end of the match the boxer from Chacarita, who had lost the match, began insulting Boca the Boca fans stormed the ring and began pummeling the boxer. In retaliation the fans from Chacarita, who my student described as “short (I think he meant small) but tough” went to the house of one of the leaders of the Boca gang and shot it up. This sort of thing doesn’t happen often in Argentina but it does happen. In 1999 and then again in 2002 the Government considered stepping in and canceling or at least postponing the season in order to restrain the violence. I read a BBC report that said that over the last century there has been more than a 150 football related murders. And while that sounds a little scary most of the violence here seems to be limited to random fistfights, the occasional head whacking and from time to time a good old fashion pre-planned brawl. (Abbey and I have been trying to take part in one of the brawls but as yet none of the gangs have properly appreciated my nun chuck skills or Abbey’s lethal abilities with the penknife.) And while the gangs do occasionally sell drugs and take part in other criminal activities I do not think that they even begin to compare with the threat that is posed by American gangs who regularly do battle for drug turf or whatever other absurd reason. And while the idea of fighting or killing someone over soccer is pretty absurd, it is really no more absurd then killing someone for money. I mean when was the last time you got to brag about what amazing dribbling skills your money has.

The gangs also do fun stuff as well like drape banners all around the stadium, give the other fans a contact high from all the pot they smoke, distribute hundreds of rolls of paper which are thrown out at the beginning of the game, initiate the songs that are sung by the fans throughout the entire game (I always wonder if they have an official choral director) and fill the stands with huge flags which are also waved throughout the entire game. We got to see these “barra bravos” in action when we went to a River Plate game. During the middle of the game two very large men came into the stands and within thirty seconds they had managed to move roughly a thousand people ten feet over to the left so that the rest of the gang could carry up a huge flag (there was probably 30 to 40 guys carrying it) which would be carried up to the back row and then dropped down over the three levels of the stadium.


Soccer and Dictators:
In 1974 it was announced that Argentina would host the 1978 World Cup, but two years later the military took over, beginning what would be a brutal dictatorship. During the 78 cup the military tried to present their country as incredibly stable, peaceful and prosperous. This plan fell through in some odd ways. When one of the dictators attended a world cup match, which Argentine lost, rumors began to circulate that the Argentine team had thrown the game as an attempt to deprive the general of the opportunity to associate himself with their glory. This was almost certainly not true, but the political ramifications of being blamed for a world cup loss were severe enough to prevent him from returning to a game. Numerous leftist organizations also used the cup to direct the world’s attention to the atrocities that were been inflicted upon the Argentine people at the time. The mothers of the Plaza de Mayo for instance felt that the cup made it possible for them to have a political presence around the globe. It was also no coincidence that a bomb was set off in front of the Finance Secretary’s home immediately after Argentina scored their fourth goal against Peru, as the finance secretary had been criticizing the government’s spending on the cup and the Argentine team just happened to need four goals to qualify for the next round. Four years later when the Military Junta began to build up support for the Fauklands/Malvinas war they did so by interlacing images of the 1978 World Cup victory in with their propaganda films. They also converted the soccer cheers from the 78 cup into a bizarre type of battle cry/marching chant. (This was perhaps done as an effort to negate the fact that after pro-Peron chants had been banned by the government, the Boca fans had converted some of their football chants into the old Peronist rhythms.)


Jack Kemp on the World Cup:
In 1986, Kemp spoke out against a congressional resolution in support of the United States hosting a future World Cup. On the House floor, Kemp famously proclaimed:

"I think it is important for all those young out there, who someday hope to play real football, where you throw it and kick it and run with it and put it in your hands, a distinction should be made that football is democratic, capitalism, whereas soccer is a European socialist sport.”

(I got this quote from a remarkable book about soccer and globalization entitled, “How Soccer Explains the World.” It is absolutely worth reading.)

Borges on the World Cup:
Jorge Luis Borges actually held a lecture on immortality which was held during their very first match of the 1978 World Cup (which was held in Argentina) as a form of some sort of passive aggressive protest against his countries obsession with Soccer. It was as though he was saying "don't be distracted by this silly game, there are higher, more noble, more important things in life which should consume your thoughts."

Think Yankees vs. Red Sox, but more so:
While each team has gangs associated with them, the two most prominent teams are Boca Juniors and River Plate, who dominate the market in every aspect of the game, including the violent aspects of the sport. They are fierce rivals as they are the two best teams in Buenos Aires and they also have a long history of going head to head against one another. Supposedly (according to Wikapedia) River used to play in the same neighborhood as Boca but were forced to move further up the river into Palermo after they lost a game which was played to decide who would stay and who would go. River is in a much wealthier area now and it has inherited the nickname of “los millionaires” after they once paid for a player with gold coins in the early part of the 20th century. Boca on the other hand is a very blue-collar neighborhood and this inevitably leads to class tensions, which are played out in the stands during the games. (One of my students who is a River fan said that they refer to the Boca fans as “Shit Venders.”) Although it would be a mistake to assume that the River fans are soft or any less aggressive than the Boca fans just because they have more money. They may be middle class or even upper class fans but they are just as crazy as their blue collar counterparts.

Get Em While they are Young:
Over the past few decades one of Argentina’s chiefs exports has been a ridiculously talented soccer player. Of the 22 players that make up the Argentine national team, 20 play internationally. While there are powerhouse Argentine clubs, such as Boca Juniors and River Plate, these teams cannot compete financially with the other big name clubs from Italy, Spain and England. What they can do is turn young kids into professional athletes. Their scouts’ comb the country looking for talent and when they find kids with real skills they bring them to Buenos Aires, or wherever the team happens to be, and put them onto teams within their farm system while also providing them with housing and schooling. My barber for instance is incredibly proud of the fact that his 14-year-old son plays for the River Plate system and although he is only 14 he plays on Rivers B team, which is directly comparable to the Triple A teams in baseball. And from what I understand there is no real illusions of preserving the beauty of amateur sports or providing these children with a great education, as soon as the team deems them worthy of making a real investment in, they become paid professionals. Competition for these spots is fierce and a few years ago it was revealed that fathers were frequently bribing youth league soccer coaches to give their sons more playing time in front of the scouts. On the flip side there is no draft system for these kids, they just go with the team that makes their family the best sales pitch or offers them the most money or the best sweeteners, girls, cars, etc. The really gifted players then go on to play for their teams in the premier league for a few years before they move on to the European leagues.

Some of the stars who have grown through this system are Carlos Tevez and Lionel Messi. “Carlitos” was 17 when he made his premier with Boca and lead them to
multiple championships, at 20 he was the star of the Olympic games in Athens scoring 8 goals in 6 games, he is now the dominant player in the Brazilian league where his club has made it clear that they will not release him for anything less than 68 million dollars? He has burns running down from his ear to his chest from an accident with some boiling water when he was a kid, he could have had the burns removed with plastic surgery but he refused because it would have meant that he would have been off the playground/soccer field for 4 months. Even more heralded then Carlitos though is the 19-year-old Lionel Messi. Messi grew up in a poor neighborhood in Rosario and suffered from a hormone deficiency as a child but he was so talented that he was recruited as a 13 year old by one of the big clubs in Spain who could afford to pay for his treatment and provide for him and his family. He began playing for the second team when he was 13, averaging more than a goal a game and he is now 19 and plays side by side with Ronaldinho (think Michael Jordan) for FC Barcelona and is widely considered to be the next Maradona. It says a lot about the depth of the Argentine System that neither of these players start for the Argentine team. However they did get into the game on Saturday and they each managed to score (Messi had an assist as well) within roughly 15 minutes.

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Photos

Futbol and Violencia
This image was cropped, in the original posters you could see one of the attackers about to swing away with a board