Of course we would like to beat our staunch rival 6-2 like that time Barça beat Madrid in 2009; on top, on a visit and with a Xavi-Iniesta-Messi dance. Of course we would pay for a dinner for ten for a 7-0 similar to that of Estudiantes a Gimnasia in 2006. We would give our cell phone for an incredible comeback like that of Independiente in La Bombonera, when they lost against Boca 4 to 3 until minute 89 and won it 5 to 4 at 95. Not to mention Liverpool’s recent 5-0 defeat of Manchester United, no less than at Old Trafford, under the noses of 70,000 red devils…
But it is too much to ask. Being a classic, with half to zero we are done. That day it doesn’t matter how, but what. There is so much at stake!
It’s Sunday, evening is falling and we start our retreat, exhausted as if we had been beaten to a pulp. Happy to the point of delirium or sad beyond measure. There is no dam for that joy or consolation for that sorrow. That volcano of passions ended and we return home.
With the passing of time, the storm of our feelings will slowly subside and the waters of the senses will run smoothly again. Yes, it seems silly, but then why do we get like this? And this includes the entire social arc of a country: from the shoe shiner to the university professor. Football runs through us intravenously.
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If we win, everything is fine, life is beautiful, the country is not so bad, the salary is enough, the smile does not loosen. We call the old man to tell him, we talk to cousins and friends who are from the same suit, WhatsApp is on fire, we see the goals a thousand times, we buy three newspapers…
If we lose, everything is black. Returning home defeated is anger, head down, not talking to anyone, going to sleep without dinner and wishing there were no Mondays or Tuesdays. Let the week start on Friday if possible. It is not buying newspapers, not listening to the radio or watching sports programs on television, putting up with the memes, swallowing the bile of rage and assimilating it.
The classic is different from everything. It is the match that you most want to win, and the one that should not be lost. The one who is afraid to lose.
A folk wonder, a beautiful social tradition, the Clásico is not just another game or event. It is the great event, the appointment of honor.
Fears conflict with ambitions. A strong bet. They are two handsome face to face knife in hand. It is the pride at stake, the love of colors. Ours and theirs. Word beauty!: ‘they’. Said like this, contemptuously, if possible with a hint of malice. ‘They’, a nice way of alluding to the adversary without naming him. All that is the classic, one of the most beautiful facets of football.
That cuteness that is the classic begins to ferment from a young age. To obtain the diploma of the good fan, it is necessary to feel a certain aversion for the rival from a very young age.
You can’t be from Nacional without hating Peñarol. How to be from Independiente without having inoculated the poison against Racing? That comes out alone, as a child. A beauty because it is only valid for the game. Later, one has endearing friends across the street, relatives, brothers who are even fans of the other painting. He even marries a fan of the opposite. How many will be crazy about Millionaires in love with a beauty from Santa Fe. And vice versa. It’s the cute. Between kisses and hugs they will say: “Today we beat them.” And the safe answer: “What are you going to win!”. Because when one talks about the club of one, the other love is put aside. That is like sovereignty: it is not negotiated.
The classic is an atavism, it has been aging for centuries, it comes from the fights between villages, to see who drank more beer, who axed more trees or which side won the cinchada with the rope. Football made it his own and brought it to our days.
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This is the weekend of the classics. And in that context, the two with the highest worldwide resonance are played: Real Madrid-Barcelona and River-Boca. The Madrid-Barça is in a way a neoclassical. Di Stéfano always said it: “In my time, our classic was Atlético”. It happened that then Atlético was falling into a well (from which Simeone rescued it) and the other two became two universal monsters, plagued with stars. And the marquee was stolen. It is clearly the most attractive European derby. Although they are not from the same city, an almost essential condition to classify as a classic.
The story of a classic that began in the neighborhood
River and Boca, on the other hand, were born with the century in the same Buenos Aires neighborhood of La Boca, four or five blocks from each other. Neighborhood of Genoese immigrants, port, full of shipyards and coal factories. Then, in 1923, a strange event occurred: River emigrated to Recoleta, the most elegant area of Buenos Aires, and the profile of his fans changed.
Then the rivalry began to have another seasoning: the elite versus the proletariat, exquisiteness versus sweat. And there River and Boca were defined forever.
This is the soul classic. Even for a journalist with half a dozen World Cups to be there, at the Monumental or La Bombonera, it’s like hanging a medal: “I saw it.” There is nothing comparable.
Barcelona-Real Madrid can move more millions, have better artists, not match this passion. And that extends to Milan-Inter, Celtic-Rangers, Lazio-Roma. In River-Boca you have to take the rest. Back in the 1960s, Juan Carlos Barberis, a discreet striker who played for both clubs, was so involved in the duel that he said: “Today I leave my blood on the pitch, mine and that of the opponents.”
The journalists set up a board and brainily explain what can happen in the classic, but the adrenaline is so great, so much lava runs behind the ball that the tactics melt like ice cream in the Sahara.
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The player swears and puts everything. How not to do it? On Friday, in the team’s last training session before the clash with Rosario Central, thirty thousand Newell’s fans came to the stadium to support their players. And it wasn’t a match! The players did push-ups and they cheered. This is, perhaps, the fiercest classic, the most fundamentalist. In Rosario there are exclusive bars for centralists and bars for ñubelistas.
Anxiety will devour the previous hours, that tingling… The longing to leave for the stadium will speed up lunch. The tension will invade the bodies of millions. And when the sun goes down and gives way to twilight, we will return. Exhausted but happy or destroyed and bitter. They are the rules of the game of a classic. Feelings in a blender, mixed and running at a thousand. And like any passion, it is beautiful to live it.
It’s too late to win by half to zero. In a classic enough and enough.
last tango…
Jorge Barraza
For the time
@JorgeBarraza OK
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