The ex-Manchester United star took advantage of the two idols’ presence to hit the winning goal for his side and send the Superliga crown to La Boca
Argentine football’s answer to the enigmatic Mona Lisa, Juan Roman Riquelme, is a hard man to read. The Boca Juniors legend’s stony facial expressions are limited in range between inscrutable and ambivalent, with a smile as painstaking to coax from him as it once was for defenders to strip him of possession during his playing days.
Fellow Xeneize idol Diego Maradona is rather easier to interpret. The combustible Gimnasia coach has never been adept at hiding his emotions and, while Roman sat impassively throughout Boca’s Superliga-sealing 1-0 win at the Bombonera – a result that, coupled with River Plate’s draw away to Atletico Tucuman, sent the trophy to La Boca – he was an electric fidgeting presence on the away bench, barely sitting still at any point before, during or after his side’s defeat.
They may be polar opposites in many ways, but both occupy a deserved place in the club’s illustrious hall of fame as two of the finest players ever to step out on the field in the middle of the picturesque Buenos Aires port neighbourhood. From Saturday onwards, though, Roman and Maradona must make room for a new idol.
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If Carlos Tevez’s credentials at Boca were even slightly in doubt prior to their thrilling triumph, snatched from the grasp of none other than arch-rivals River, there can be absolutely no question now that he is up there with the very best in club history.
Such a story of redemption looked unlikely as recently as the start of 2020. Tevez had bounced in and out of the Boca first team since returning from that lucrative yet ill-fated jaunt to China, the years apparently taking its toll on the former Manchester United, City and Juventus star. In 2018 he started on the bench in both his side’s Copa Libertadores final clashes against River, seeing only 10 minutes of action in the second leg as the Xeneize’s hopes were extinguished in the Santiago Bernabeu.
That defeat ended Guillermo Barros Schelotto’s time as coach. Yet another Copa disappointment at the hands of River, this time in the 2019 semi-final, all but doomed replacement Gustavo Alfaro who, like his predecessor, saw Tevez as an impact player off the bench rather than a dependable starter.
His chances appeared even dimmer when Jorge Amor Ameal romped to victory in Boca’s presidential elections, with Riquelme as his vice. An intimate friend of predecessor Daniel Angelici and protagonist of more than one public spat with Roman, at 36 the question was would Carlitos even stay at the Bombonera under new management?
Both Tevez and Riquelme have answered their doubters in emphatic fashion. “I want to look him in the eye and find out what he wants,” Riquelme told reporters of Tevez in December.
“In my neighbourhood I used to play football and I think he did the same, but I think he lost his appetite to play two years ago. We want to see if we are capable of getting Carlitos back so he can enjoy himself and make us enjoy ourselves.”
The hunger, suffice it to say, is still there. Tevez smashed six goals in Boca’s last six games, including a ripping effort to down Gimnasia on Saturday, as the side now coached by 2007 Libertadores winner Miguel Angel Russo came flying down the track, winning all six of those clashes to beat River to the crown in thrilling circumstances.
He may have kicked off the title decider by sharing a kiss with Diego – “I knew I had to do it, it was good luck”, he told reporters after the game – but by full time the entire Bombonera came together in showing the forward its affection, proclaiming the Superliga was won “by the hand of Carlitos Tevez” in raucous celebrations that spilled out of the stadium into the streets of Buenos Aires and continued long into Sunday morning.
Gracious even in the euphoria of victory, Tevez signalled the impassive Riquelme as crucial to his and Boca’s resurrection. “Roman is very important, it was very clear from the first talk. He also helped me a lot to find that Carlitos, this is the reward,” he signalled to reporters, while also referring to that first warning fired by his vice president: “I got my appetite for glory back.
“I felt again that I had to return to my roots, get rid of a lot of things. Like a kid recently beginning. That was fundamental.”
Tevez of course is no stranger to glory at the Bombonera. He now boasts five Primera Division titles in Boca colours, four of which have come since his first return in 2015; as well as Libertadores and Intercontinental Cup gold in 2003. In total he boasts 28 major titles in his glittering career, sitting behind only Lionel Messi and Lucho Gonzalez as the most decorated Argentine in football history. One feels, however, that this latest prize might just rank among his most treasured.
From the frustrated, marginalised figure that at the turn of the year was drifting out of football and close to hanging up his boots altogether, Carlitos is back as Boca’s talisman. At 36 he seems to finally have learned that guile and experience can compensate for losing that explosive pace and power that made him one of football’s elite forwards and is adjusting his game accordingly.
Carlitos will be around for a while yet at the Bombonera, with all eyes trained on the Libertadores trophy that has proved so painfully elusive since his return. But whether he gets the chance to take the title again or not, there can no longer be any argument: he stands alongside Maradona and Riquelme in the annals of Xeneize history and deserves his status as an all-time club legend.