Month: May 2017

Campeonato Metropolitano or, to use the full name, Campeonato de Primera Division Soberania Nacional. Perhaps the more important championship for the big clubs – it was a grueling classic league full of derbies and local rivalries. But this year there was the Malvinas war, the World Cup, and that on top of the ongoing political unrest, repression, economic hardship, still on top of seemingly eternal corruption, financial difficulties, and massive exodus of players. All combined… almost impossible to find the key factor, but Maradona moved to Barcelona, Kempes returned to Valencia, and the Italian clubs were offering big money for Argentine stars. River Plate without Kempes and especially Boca Juniors without Maradona were weakened and Campeonato Nacional showed a general weakness of all big clubs, but the second championship was a different matter and only River Plate and Boca Juniors underperformed. Relegation was the prime concern at the bottom of league – which brings a word on promotion. Two teams were going down, two teams were going up – one promotional spot was clear: the champions of Second Division. A play-off between lower placed teams decided the second spot – so far, so good. But the record of Campeonato Nacional shows one more promotion: Atletico Racing (Cordoba). However, they were eliminated at the quarter-finals and if the reason for such promotion would be that the qualifying to the semi-finals teams were all members of First Division, then the question why Atletico Racing still remains, for they were not the only lower-division club at the quarter-finals: San Martin (Tucuman) was also there and ended with slightly better record than Atletico Racing. But whatever the reason, the promotion of Atletico Racing concerned the 1982 championship, not the 1983 one – after playing Nacional, they joined Metropolitano – with them the league had 19 teams in 1982, as opposed to 18 in 1981. So, relegation and promotion for the next season concerned only the bottom of the league as ever.

After 36 rounds were played, the dust settled: Sarmiento (Junin) finished last with 24 points. More or less, expected relegation. The second relegation was decided by a play-off between the 17th, Union (Santa Fe) and the 18th , Quilmes. Both finished with 27 points – that most likely was the reason for the play-off. Union clinched 1-0 victory and survived.

Standing from left: Clide Díaz, Tocalli, Milozzi, Gáspari, Zárate, Oscar E. Gizzi.

First row: Lorea, Acevedo, Víctor L. Martínez, Converti, Oscar A. Gissi.

Interesting anomaly: Quilmes almost won Campeonato Nacional, nearly repeating their success only a few years back, but Metropolitano was not their cup of tea – they were relegated practically at the same time they won the other championship, managed to return immediately to first division and were relegated just as quickly. In a single year Quilmes was vice-champions and relegated – a rare moment of football history.

And it was also interesting to see how the champions of Nacional played in the second championship: nothing much…

Ferro Carril Oeste finished 9th with 37 points – pretty much as they usually performed. Finished above River Plate, though.

Let keep out Racing Club – its horror story was going on for 15 years already and there was no end. 16th place this year was just another sad chapter of it, but nothing surprising.

Argentinos Juniors was 12th. Maradona left them and they sunk immediately.

River Plate finished 10th – if Argentinos Juniors’ drop was well understood – really one-player team and without him there was nothing to keep them up, River Plate was a big collapse. They were on top just and year ago and Kempes was not the decisive factor. But suddenly they were.

Rosario Central ended 8th, which was another unusually weak performance, for they had strong previous years.

The opposite road took two teams – Atletico Racing (Cordoba), newcomers, playing top division thanks to good performance at Campeonato Nacional earlier in the year, finished 7th.

Nueva Chicago, just promoted from Second Division, finished 15th. Not really newcomers, but for them to merely survive among the best was a success.

At the top of the table were well known names, but let not make mistake: it was not like they played all that well.

Velez Sarsfield was 5th – but with 42 points they were not part of the race for the title at all. Standing from left: Cuciuffo, Jorge, Juan D. Cabrera, Pumpido, Moralejo, Daniel Killer.

First row: Bujedo, Lucero, Bianchi, Alonso, Ischia.

Not a great squad… Carlos Bianchi and Daniel Killer were the stars. Cuciuffo and Pumpido were promising, at best – their fame came a few years later. To a point, Velez Sarsfield is more than good example of the state of the Argentine clubs: plausible performance depended often on aging stars, returning form abroad – Carlos Bianchi was still good enough for domestic football and was the only well known name to finish among the best scorers of the season: 3rd with 13 goals (hawever, in Campeonato Nacional – out of top 5 scorers in Campeonato Metropolitano). Younger stars were no longer around…

Newell’s Old Boys – 4th with 44 points. Tata Martino was with them, but… Tata Martino is more famous today, as a coach, then he was at his playing days. Simon, Scoponi, may be Santamaria… not exactly superstar.

Boca Juniors ended 3rd with 48 points. Maradona left them for Barcelona and Boca Juniors immediately followed the fate of Argentinos Juniors – although, it was not exactly the same kind of team and finished higher. Higher, but the title was out of reach, therefore, the season was wasted.

Independiente was 2nd and actually fought for the title – but still lost it. Compared to the squad of the first half of the 1970s, this one was rather insignificant.

Estudiantes (La Plata) won the championship with 21 wins, 12 ties, and 3 losses, 50-18 goal-difference. Six clubs outscored them, but none came even close to their defensive record. Of the bog clubs, they were the only one to play strong and it was great for them, for Estudiantes rather faded away in the 1970s. Yet, a look at the squad tells the story of this season: Trobbiani surely and Brown eventually were the big names.

Another version of the starters shows Alejando Sabella too, but he left to play in England. That was the situation of the Argentine clubs at that time: the best were going to play in Europe, impoverishing already rather thin squads. Success seemingly depended on momentary form – whichever team managed to keep a tight, disciplined, and even outdated defensively oriented group of 13-15 players would likely succeed. Estudiantes was hardly a flashy or memorable team, so imagine the others. Consider this: Maradona left Boca Juniors and a team like Estudiantes had no trouble to finish well above Boca. But whatever the general musings, Estudiantes did well and brought joy to their fans. Nothing more important than a title.

 

The Championships – well, Argentina had two championships and champions for years: Nacional and Metropolitano. A few words before going into them. The 1982 World Cup may have been a disastrous factor, because the leading club performed poorly. The exodus of star players also affected the clubs, particularly Boca Juniors – Maradona moved to Spanish Barcelona. Not just River Plate and Boca Juniors had a weak year – all the big names underperformed: Independiente, Newell’s Old Boys, Velez Sarsfield, Huracan, Rosario Central, and no need to really mention Racing Club, which mostly struggled to survive ever since they lost so much money in 1967, their most triumphal year. Of course, it was not just the World Cup – Argentine football was in desperate financial situation for many years, corruption and mismanagement were the norm, and on top of that were the current and no longer new, but just deepening, political and economic difficulties of the country – so far, crowned by the fresh Malvinas Islands war. Well, when one suffers, another has the best of times.

Campeonato Nacional. The true national championship, to which regional clubs had a chance to rub shoulders with the big boys and, occasinally, even to outplay them. This year was not the year of the small fry, but the year of the very small fry, for many hardly ever heard of clubs not just qualified to play in the Nacional, but actually ruled it. Clubs, like

Union San Vicente (Cordoba) – 7th in Group B. They were not alone – there were many: Guarani Antonio Franco (Posadas), Deportivo Roca (General Roca), and Renato Cesarini (Rosario) in Group D; Mariano Moreno (Junin) and Central Norte (Salta) in Group C; Estudiantes ( Santiago del Estero), San Lorenzo (Mar del Plata), and Atletico Concepcion (Banda del Rio Sali) in Group B; Independiente Rivadavia (Mendoza) in Group A. They all put some fight and inconvenienced the big clubs, of which only one emerged from the group stage: Estadiantes (La Plata). The rest were eliminated… Newell’s Old Boys was 3rd and River Plate 6th in Group A; Independiente – 3rd, and Argentinos Juniors – 4th in Group B; Rosario Central – 3rd, Boca Juniors – 4th, and Huracan 6th in Group C; Velez Sarsfield – 3rd and Racing Club – 8th and last in the table of Group D. Only Independiente was a bit unlucky of the big clubs – they failed to reach the next stage on worse goal-difference. Even the second-tier clubs were not particularly strong, although most of them took advantage of the weakness of the big clubs. So, to the next stage qualified: Quilmes (Quilmes) and Independiente Rivadavia (Mendoza) from Group A; Ferro Carril Oeste (Buenos Aires) and Union (Santa Fe) from Group B; Estudiantes (La Plata) and Talleres (Cordoba) from Group C; and Atletico Racing (Cordoba) and San Martin (Tucuman) from Group D.

In the ¼ finals Estudiantes, Ferro Carril Oeste, Talleres, and Quilmes eliminated their opponents, so at least a first division club was going to win the championship. Quilmes had the toughest time qualifying – they prevailed over Union only by penalty shoot-out.

Here the march of Independiente Rivadavia ended, but the boys deserve a note – a small club, rarely, if at all, playing at big tournaments. They were 2nd – and that only because of worse goal-difference – in Group A, leaving behind Newell’s Old Boys, River Plate, and Instituto (Cordoba). They met Ferro Carril Oeste, historically, a weaker opponent than the clubs they already left in the dust, and were fairly equal – 0-0 and 0-1. An excellent season for this players!

The semi-finals were the true end of the big clubs – Ferro Carril Oeste eliminated Talleres 4-0 and 4-4; and Quilmes won twice against Estudiantes – 2-0 and 1-0.

Unlikely final… Ferro Carril Oeste vs Quilmes. Old clubs, well known in Argentina, but more likely a third-tier clubs, although Quilmes was quite successful in the recent years, enjoying a good spell. So far, for very soon in this very year the spell was over. But at the moment there was no sigh of decline – Quilmes managed a 0-0 tie at the inhospitable stadium of Ferro Carril Oeste. The easiest part was coming – a home game. It was not easy at all – Ferro Carril Oeste won 2-0 and with this – the title.

Quilmes lost, but for this smallish club second place also equals success – vice-champions! Great! Standing from left: Clide Díaz, Tocalli, Milozzi, Gáspari, Zárate, Oscar Emilio Gizzi;

First row: Lorea, Frediani, Acevedo, Converti, Oscar Antonio Gissi.

Not a single big name, not even familiar names – a testimony of this Argentine season.

If Quilmes was happy with 2nd place, imagine the joy of the champions – Ferro Carril Oeste never won a title before. Standing from left: Carlos Arregui, Gómez, Garré, Cúper, Rocchia, Basigalup.

First row: Saccardi, Juárez, Márcico, Cañete, Crocco.

Unlike Quilmes, the champions had a star – not a first rate star, but still a star: Garre. He hardly made the whole difference, but was an advantage somewhat. Well, the real advantage was stronger squad, compared to the one Quilmes had. And what a moment they had! The club from the neighbourhood Caballito, Buenos Aires, was found in 1904 and to this moment their best triumphs were winning the Second Division. They did 6 times, most recently in 1978 – this is to say that first division football, let alone success, was rare thing for the club associated with railroad company at its birth. Their big triumph to date, a true success – champions at last! Yes, they beat just the ‘beermakers’, but first title is historic event for any club in the world. The big golden moment. And as a final note – in the early years their colours were maroon and lighblue – taken from Aston Villa, for the English influence was big: the railroad company was British at that time, so the first white kit with black socks was changed in 1907. In 1911 the colours were changed again and Ferro uses green and white to this very day (except 1974, when orange and white was used, paying tribute to the great Holland of that time). Hector Cuper and Alberto Marcico were the noticeable players of the golden generation, but Oscar Garre was the real stars – the defender was born in 1956 and played for Ferro from 1974 to 1988. He was included in the Argentine national team in 1983 and played a total of 39 matches for it in 5 years, becoming a world champion in 1986. But the real hero was the coach:

Carlos Timoteo Griguol came in 1979 from lowly Kimberley, but he already had a strong reputation from winning the championship with Rosario Central in 1973 and working in Mexico after that. He was at the perfect coaching age – 46: still young, but with plenty of experience. Although one of the best coaches at the time, his name is quite unknown – the reason is he preferred conservative style and because of that he was never seriously considered a national team coach. Conservative or not, he made Ferro Carril Oeste champions for the first time in their history. He made them champions twice, but the second title was still in the unknown future, so let stay with the moment – nobody supporting Ferro will ever forget it.

Argentina. Second Division, or Primera B. Concerns only the Metropolitano championship, largely concentrated in Buenos Aires, and having promotion and relegation. Of course, there were lower levels too. 22 teams divided into 2 groups – the top placed teams continued in direct elimination to compete for the title and the last placed faced relegation to the Third Division. Some well known – today, at least – clubs played in Primera B: San Lorenzo, Banfield, Lanus, Chacarita Juniors, Arsenal, Tigre. Group A was more provincial – the clubs from Santa Fe, Cordoba, and of the Buenos Aires Province were largely there, and the clubs from Metro Buenos Aires were largely in Group B. The geographical division perhaps shaped relegation and promotion, for otherwise the rules seem peculiar: the league system was best organized in Metro Buenos Aires in different league levels and there were the strongest clubs in terms of money and popularity anyway. Thus, one team was directly promoted to First Division, 8 teams competed for the second promotional spot; one team was directly relegated to the Third Division and 2 teams – trying to escape from the second relegation spot. Both teams directly going up and down were related to the Buenos Aires league system – at least, this is the likeliest explanation.

Argentino de Quilmes was last in Group A with 29 points and went down directly. The 10th in Group A – Talleres – and the last in Group B – All Boys – went to the relegation play-off. Since both Argentino de Quilmes and All Boys belonged to Buenos Aires system, points were seemingly the decisive factro: Argentino de Quilmes finished with 29 points and All Boys – with 36.

All Boys won the play-off – the match ended 0-0 and All Boys prevailed at the penalty shoot-out 3-2.

All Boys survived at the last moment.

Talleres went down. That is Talleres Buenos Aires, not to be confused with the better known Talleres Cordoba.

With relegation out of the way, let us move up the tables.

Tigre was 9th in Group A – not a surprise, really, for at that time Tigre was lowly club unlikely to play higher than Second Division football. So was Arsenal, 7th in Group A. So was Lanus, 7th in Group B. To a point, Colon (Santa Fe) was the big disappointment – 8th in Group A. Colon was to be at least a prime candidate for promotion, but failed.

At the top of both groups the fight went on to the next stage: Gimnasia y Esgrima (La Plata) won Group A, followed by Chacarita Juniors, Almirante Brown, and Deportivo Espanol. Deportivo Armenio ended 5th and missed the play-offs by a point. In Group B the champion had direct promotion, so to the play-offs went those placed from 2nd to 5th: Atlanta, Banfield, Temperley, and Deportivo Italiano. Lucky Deportivo Italiano, for they qualified only thanks to the direct promotion of the group champion and better goal-difference than Defensores de Belgrano. Anyhow, Deportivo Italiano, Almirante Brown, Chacarita Juniors, and Deportivo Espanol were eliminated at the ¼ finals. Gimnasia y Esgrima and Banfield lost at the semi-finals and Atlanta and Temperley faced each other at the final. Temperley won its home leg 2-1, then Atlanta won 1-0 at home and the matter had to be settled by penalty shoot-out, which was dramatic: Temperley finally won 13-12!

A great moment in the history of small Temperley – they clinched promotion to First Division. Standing from left: Issa, Cassé, Piris, Masotto, Villalba, Aguilar.

First row: Dabrowski, Scotta, Finarolli, Lacava Schell, Espósito.

The direct promotion went to San Lorenzo. Perhaps the reason was they had better record – San Lorenzo won fair and square Group B – 23 wins, 11 ties, and 8 matches lost, 56-27 goal-difference, 57 points. 10 points ahead of second placed Atlanta. And 7 points more than the record of the champions of Group A, Gimnasia y Esgrima (La Plata), which finished with 49 points.

If for most second-division clubs a promotion was a big success, for San Lorenzo it was a must – the club was among the big names, they were champions full of stars not that long ago. But they suffered a decline, leading them to second division football. Quick return to the top league was expected – and achieved – but San Lorenzo was still in poor shape: the names of the squad clearly tell that – Rubén Cousillas, Oscar Quiroga, Osvaldo Biain, Hugo Moreno, HéctorOsvaldo López, Ricardo Collavini, Rubén Darío Insua, Leonardo Madelon,Carlos Schamberger, Armando Quinteros, Jorge Rinaldi, Hugo Paulino Sánchez, Eugenio Morel Bogado, Carlos Suárez, Eduardo Abrahamian, RubénAraoz, Pablo Comelles, Ricardo Demagistris, Raúl Moreno, HugoVerdecchia, Miguel Batalla, Marcelo Milano, Oscar Ricardo Ros, Omar Dagorret, Héctor Raúl López, Claudio Marasco, Claudio Pérez.

Well, at least San Lorenzo returned to First Division.

Uruguay. Usually, the least complicated and easy to understand championship, but not this year. Relegation was a messy mystery – the rest was normal. The First Division was going to be reduced again – from 14 teams to 13 in the 1983. Hard to tell why and also hard to tell when the decision was made because the seasonal records do not tally. The simplest way was 2 teams relegated and 1 promoted from the Second Division. Relegation was never just the last in the final table – usually, it was a combined record of the few previous seasons, the newest league members excluded, and the the team with least combined points going down. But not this year…

Colon FC (Montevideo) won the Second Division. Normally, no problem – this was the team promoted. But Colon did not get to play top league football – it was not promoted at all, not even participating in the promotion/relegation tournament. Yes, Colon was a tiny club, but since the whole championship involved only Montevideo clubs, it was nothing unusual for a small club to play in the top league. Anyhow, Colon won the Second Division and nothing more.

But promotion still was an issue, for after the end of the season promotion/relegation tournament was played between 4 teams – Liverpool, 11th in the First Division, and arguably, the last in the combined league record – otherwise, there was no reason for them to be facing relegation. Its opponents came from Second Division: Fenix, El Tanque Sisley, and Racing. Colon was not among the participants and one may think that at that stage the next year to league would have been still 14-team strong, Colon getting direct promotion. But which club was going down, if that was the case? Never mind, worse follows. Fenix won the relegation/promotion tournament with 7 points and better goal-difference than Liverpool, also with 7 points. As most often was the case in South America, goal-difference did not count and Liverpool and Fenix met again: Liverpool won 2-0. By the record, they were safe…

Liverpool – leaving 3 teams behind in the championship, but having but having still to fight for survival and, seemingly, successfully. After winning the promotion/relegation tournament Liverpool was relegated. What was the point for this promotion/relegation tournament, then? Anyway, Liverpool won and was relegated. Colon won and was not promoted. No team was promoted, in fact, and the the league was reduced – same members minus Liverpool. If you are collecting amusing anomalies, South America is your prime source: there not only a team with a negative goal-difference quite often finished first, but now a winning team was relegated.

In another country, even South American one, a team like Huracan Buceo was to be relegated without any fuss: they were dead last with 16 points.

River Plate was 13th with 19 points. Clearly, Huracan Buceo was hopeless outsider this season, but had nothing to worry… River Plate had no worries too.

Miramar Misiones, 12th with 20 points also had no worries.

Liverpool – 11th with 22 points was the only team to worry. Never mind the seasonal performance, never mind the following win of the promotion/relegation tournament…

Rampla Juniors finished 9th – there is the sense that Rampla should have been much higher, just bellow Penarol and Nacional, but reality was different for a long time: may be popular, but Rampla for a long time was kind of declining and practically a mid-table club, more likely to fight to survival instead of for medals.

Danubio was slowly moving in the opposite direction of Rampla Juniors – not down, but up. Slowly, though – they finished 7th, distinguishing themselves as the team with most ties this year: 12. Standing from left: ÁlvaroPérez , Javier Zeoli , Ruben Dopico, Pierino Lattuada, Miguel Beltran , Cesar Javier Vega.

First row: Eliseo Rivero ,Christian Guaita, CarlosBerrueta,Gustavo Dalto, Rúben Sosa .

Anything memorable or just curious? One Argentine player – Guaita – who came from Estudiantes (La Plata) and one Portuguese, unfortunately not on the photo – Custodio Mendes. Well, he was no longer Portuguese, but naturalized Argentinian. And Ruben Sosa – at this time still a teenager, a promising junior.

Sud America was 6th , not a bad season really.

The next 4 had more at stake – not just position, but also a chance to play in Copa Libertadores – Uruguay, as a current holder of the cup, had three spots in the tournament and 4 teams competed for 2 spots in a mini-tournament after the end of the season.

Wanderers finished 5th in the championship, but put a good fight in the following mini-league and got one of the Copa Libertadores spots. Well done.

Bella Vista was 4th – strong year for the club.

Defensor finished 3rd with with 34 points – 5 ahead of Bella Vista and losing silver medals only on goal-difference. Strong season and, as often was the case in Uruguay in general and Defensor in particular, a strong season meant having one great, if aging, star – on this occasion, Baudilio Jauregui. Enough to give the scare to Nacional…

Nacional had a much stronger – by names – squad than Defensor, yet only better goal-difference placed them above. Juan Masnik was at the helm – an young coach, just recently still a major playing star – but very likely the brass and the fans of Nacional did not fancy him much at the moment: silver does not count. Yes, Nacional won the final tournament and thus kept its place in Copa Libertadores, but this was a last ditch effort.

Counting the titles of Penarol is really pointless, but this one was quite impressive: 15 wins, 9 ties, and only 2 games lost. 47-22 goal-difference and 39 points – leaving the arch-enemy Nacional 5 points behind. The best defensive record in the championship and only Defensor scored more goals. And the Uruguayan title was just the domestic part of this excellent for Penarol year – there is still plenty to talk about this squad, so no need to give their names yet.