Boca and Racing collide for the Argentine Super Cup in the United Arab Emirates and the old fires are rekindled in the desert

It doesn’t matter how far you play the game. Nor what are the customs, the culture of the place or the setting (there had never been an official match played between two Argentine teams 14,000 kilometers apart). Nor that here have received the two establishments as stars. The customs of South American football and, basically, Argentine football are maintained. Because the spade between Boca and Racing that broke out in the Champions Trophy in San Luis is now getting worse in Al Ainthe fourth largest city in the UAE and an appendage of busy Abu Dhabi. The fire is rekindled in the desert.

Although they started from the same airport, they flew on the same plane and Dario Benedetto tried to qualify the spite they carry with them from the final one by saying that they are “professionals” and “there is a certain respect” in this place in the United Arab Emirates United the teams moved separately during organized pre-game recreation.

Each campus at a different time went to visit the Qasr Al Muwaiji Fortconsidered a Unesco site and a hundred-year home of the Al Nahyan family which opened to the public in 2015, and the Al-Ain Oasis, where there are 147 thousand date palms and more than 100 different varieties of vegetation that make you forget you are in a desert.

it was not expected They walked together as if on a graduation trip, but it is clear that they carry what happened in San Luis. Because if it’s true that what happens on the pitch stays there, it’s also true that on the pitch it’s where you take your revenge. And it is in this very particular context that they meet again.

Before the match, what the Boca and Racing teams did together –bound by the protocol– was the press conference this Thursday. on the one hand there was Alan Varella; of the other, ivan pillud.

“It’s important to represent Argentine football in this city, especially after the national team won the World Cup a month ago”remarked the 36-year-old defender referring to the International Super Cup, a product that Claudio Tapia has managed to export in this sporting reopening of the Arab world to the West and which It goes hand in hand with what happened a month ago in Qatar, where Argentina were world champions.

In addition to the consecration of the national team, the memory of what happened at the La Pedrera stadium in Villa Mercedes is still fresh, where Racing won a trophy after the expulsion of Darío Benedetto for his gesture towards the referee Facundo Tello. he left Boca with six players, a situation which made it impossible to continue the game.

For this new final, the AFA has decided to do it cancel all suspensions so that in Al Ain it could be both Tube like the other nine who saw the red card that afternoon of 6 November in San Luis, as well as Guillermo Pol Fernández, who owes a one-match suspension for accumulating yellow cards.

More than two months after that duel, Boca and Racing will meet again at the hazza bin zayed stadium from Al Ain, the field they recognized this Thursday and in which Hugo Ibarra and Fernando Gago gave no clues about the teams that will take the field on Friday at 19:30 here, 12:30 in Argentina.

Boca have three goalkeepers at their disposal – with Javi García ahead of Chiquito Romero and Agustín Rossi – and they have all trained, so they continue to no one knows who will stop. Beyond that unknown factor, the rest of the team that Ibarra stopped in the last training session was Advíncula, Roncaglia, Sandez, Fabra, Pol, Varela, Ramírez, Villa, Benedetto and Briasco.

Racing also recognized the stadium and a football training session of which only 15 minutes were seen. Gago hides the team and did not provide details on what the lineup will be like, which will be kept until the last moment. It will be communicated to the players before lunch and it will only be known when the team leaves for the stadium.

Al Ain, United Arab Emirates. Special delivery.