Argentine soccer is plagued by a bullshit macho culture where the biggest sin is losing and the biggest virtue is lunging about, heedlessly throwing your body into as many opponents as possible to prove how large your testicles are. For a short clip demonstrating the anarchic, violent , dive-y style of soccer this culture has created, look no further than this video from a game in the Argentine second division this weekend:



The match was a playoff between Almagro and Central Córdoba for a spot in the promotion final. By my count, I spot five barging, card-worthy tackles, a couple of which would’ve been clear red cards in a saner league but only one of which earned a yellow, at least twice as many fouls, two blatant dives, including one in which a Central player tried to act like the referee clocked him in the face with an elbow while the ref was showing teammate Leonardo Acosta his second yellow card of the match (what, was he trying to get the ref to send himself off?), and one outburst of inconsolable crying as Acosta finally stopped trying to yell his way out of his red card and accepted that he’d probably just sealed Almagro’s fate. Central did go on to win by a score of 2-1.


Argentine soccer is rotten, but at least the rottenness sometimes manifests itself in funny clips like this rather than some guy burning down his buddy’s house.