Viva la futbol!

---

Seeing as South America is the place to watch football, it seemed only fitting to go to a match. It was Racing Club (the local team) vs Belgrano. It was a big match as it was the last of the season and Racing had to win to stay in the premier league whilst Belgrano had to win to move up.

After a lot of persuading we managed to get a taxi to take all five of us to the Racing stadium. There were so many people around shooting off flares and fire crackers. Riot police were everywhere. The atmosphere was electric.

We managed to get seats in the Belgrano side. We queued up with the other fans to get searched and then went to find the section that we were supposed to be sitting in - via the burger stand - I was starving. As we walked up the final set of stairs and into the seating area I was hit by a wall of noise. It was incredible. The fans of both sides were so hyped up and were all singing their teams’ songs, letting off blue and white flares, waving team flags and generally making the stadium almost bounce. In fact when we had chosen some seats and made ourselves at home we could actually feel the whole floor bouncing when the fans stood up to sing. It was quite scary to think that the concrete beneath our feet was actually bouncing under the sheer weight of the crowds.

The teams came on to the field and the match began. For someone who’s never really been interested in football and having never been to a match before it was a pretty good game. The crowds settled down once the match started although half way through the Belgrano fans sitting near us realised that there were some Racing fans sitting in our section. The seats in the Racing stands were sold out but being desperate to see the match, they'd risked sitting in the Belgrano stands. This was understandable but what was stupid was the fact that they didn’t respect the opposition even though they were sitting on the wrong side. When Racing scored the one and only goal these fans got a little bit excited which annoyed the opposition slightly and it was obvious that something was about to happen. The Racing fans fled for the barriers in order to escape the wrath of the opposition. Bearing in mind that they had the option of climbing over a very high fence with barbed wire at the top or edging their way round the side of the barrier which involved almost hanging over the side of the level we were on with the risk of falling to the seats below, their means of escape wasn’t particularly appealing. The Belgrano fans watched them with amusement for a little while but then decided to pull up the seats that were screwed into the concrete and use them as frisbees; hurling them like missiles at the Racing fans. The riot police were standing between the two sets of fans trying to stop anything more sinister from happening. Luckily the Racing fans managed to escape with only one guy being injured slightly by a flying seat and everyone settled down. It was a pretty exciting and scary introduction to the world of South American football.

After the game the Belgrano side of the stadium was allowed to leave first for safety reasons which meant that we had a head start on the hunt for a taxi. There were riot police everywhere - it was now more as a deterrent than a necessity but it had previously been because there had been too much violence at these matches. Apparently what we had witnessed wasn’t particularly serious.

It was great to see a football match but the fans were what made the experience so memorable.

---