Mateo Retegui and his return to Bombonera: the Tigre scorer who only played 8 minutes in Boca and chose exile to be successful

Barely eight minutes he was able to play Mateo Retegui with the Boca shirt. Eight minutes that have been lost in a misty distance because of the four and a half years that have passed and the chapters that his life has added in that time. This Sunday the striker will return to the Bombonera for the fifth time to play with his team, the Tiger, a match corresponding to the 18th round of the Professional Soccer League. And he will do it at the best time of his career.

That Saturday 17 November 2018, Boca was ninth in the Superlega led by Racing, but the attention of players, technical staff, managers and fans was not focused on that afternoon’s match against Patronato, for the 13th round of the internal match, but rather in the rematch of the Copa Libertadores final that the team led by Guillermo Barros Schelotto would play a week later against River and that it would not be played due to the attack on the Xeneize team together before arriving at the Monumental.

That November 17th Boca beat the Entre Ríos team 1-0 with a goal from Cristian Espinoza 36 minutes into the second half. Seconds after that goal, Carlos Tevez made way for a 19-year-old who, in his short spell on the pitch, earned himself a yellow card for a tough offense against goalkeeper Sebastián Bértoli. that boy was Matthew Retegui.

The child born in San Fernando on April 29, 1999, son of Carlos Retegui, former coach of Las Leonas and Los Leoneshad started his sporting career in field hockey (he came to integrate a youth team), had made the leap to soccer in the lower divisions of River and, after being released from the club Núñez, he had landed in Boca on Jorge’s initiative coki Raffo.

Barros Schelotto promoted him to the First Division in 2017, after observing him in the Reserves under Rolando Schiavi, and taking him on the bench in two games in December of that year (against Arsenal and Estudiantes), although he didn’t give him minutes until almost a year later, in that duel against the patronage. After the traumatic defeat against River at the Santiago Bernabéu, the separation of Twin and the arrival of Gustavo Alfaro, there was no place for him. Then began the search for his place in the world.

First he was loaned to Estudiantes for 18 months. In the La Plata team he played 29 games (15 as a starter) and scored five goals. One of those many served for the click will beat Diego Armando Maradona’s Gimnasia 1-0 at Forest on 2 November 2019 for the 12th round of the Super League. Thus he removed a thorn, given that in the first classic, on March 10 of that year, he had been sent off for a blow to Lucas Licht just two minutes after entering the field.

When his loan expired and while Argentine football was on hiatus due to the coronavirus pandemic, Estudiantes decided not to avail themselves of their option to buy, set at $2 million, so the striker rejoined their squad. Mouth. However, Miguel Ángel Russo made it clear from the outset that he was not going to have it among his priorities.

Although an offer from Italian Pescara had arrived in September 2020, Retegui ended up being transferred to Talleres a month later. With the Cordoba team he played 61 matches in 14 months, scored 7 goals and finished second in the Copa Argentina. His team lost the final of that tournament on penalties against Boca on December 8, 2021 at the Único Madre de Ciudades stadium in Santiago del Estero. That night, the striker got into Nahuel Tenaglia’s recovery, executed and converted the first goal in a definition.

In January 2022, he returned to training for the Xeneize team in the preseason and soon learned that Even Sebastián Battaglia will not take this into account. Then he accepted a new assignment, this time at the Tiger and for two years. There he found his place: he finished as runners-up in the League Cup (after another final loss against Boca, this time in Córdoba) and top scorer in the league (he made 19) in his first year, and he’s also the top goalscorer in the competition this year (takes 10). With the Matador shirt he scored 34 goals in 59 games.

These good performances earned him a call to Selected Italianwith which he made his debut on March 23 of this year in the 2-1 defeat against England at the Diego Armando Maradona stadium in Naples for the first qualifying round for the German Eurocup 2024. That day he not only became the 22nd Argentine to represent the Bluesbut also he scored the only goal for the side led by Roberto Mancini. Three days later, they repeated the dose in a 2-0 win against Malta at the Ta’Qali National Stadium.

His goals and the extra exposure the team has given him have caused interest in his services to multiply. At the end of 2022, requests from Udinese and the American DC United had arrived. After his Italian call there were calls from Milan, Inter, Lazio, Rome and Naples. Although his pass belongs entirely to Boca, Tigre has an option to buy 50% of the chip for $2.4 million. Everything indicates that it will make it effective and that it will distribute profits with the xeneize when the footballer leaves for Europe, most likely in a couple of months.

Before that almost certain intercontinental journey, Retegui will return to the Bombonera this weekend face there for the fifth time the club that is also rubbing its hands thinking about a possible transfer. In his previous four visits, he has been victorious twice and defeated twice.

The first time was on September 15, 2019, when Boca beat Estudiantes 1-0 with a goal from Cordoba’s Emanuel Reynoso. That day, Retegui started the match on the substitutes’ bench for Gabriel Milito’s team and I put 21 minutes in the plugin for Facundo Mura.

With Workshop, on the other hand, he won twice and was a starter at both. On November 15, 2020, the people of Cordoba won 1-0 with a goal from Joel Soñora for the third round of group 4 of the Diego Maradona Cup. And on 21 March 2021, for the sixth matchday of zone B of the Super League Cup, they triumphed 2-1 with goals from Carlos Auzqui and Diego Valoyes (Michael Santos, against, scored for Boca).

His last excursion to Brandsen 805 was on June 15 last year, already with Tigre, in a great game that Boca won 5-3 for the third round of the Professional League. In that duel Retegui scored twice in the second half: the first, with a header, on a pass from another former Boca player, Facundo Colidio; the second, from a penalty, after a hand ball by Nicolás Figal in the box. This Sunday will try to celebrate again.