Boca and Juniors, champion of the 2022 Professional League, and Racing Club, winner of the Champions Trophy, will star this Friday in the final of the first edition of the International Super Cup to be held in the United Arab Emirates. The match, broadcast by DSports and Flow, will take place from 12:30 p.m. in Argentina at the Hazza bin Zayed Stadium in the city of Al Ain. The referee will be the Argentine Fernando Rapallini, who will have Juan Pablo Belatti and Diego Bonfá as assistants, while the VAR will be in charge of Héctor Paletta.
Each team will receive 1,300,000 dollars for participating in this Super Cup and 200,000 more will be added to the winning team. An agreement between the AFA and the Abu Dhabi Sports Council (ADSC) gave life to this unprecedented trophy, which was qualified as “International” when played abroad and which will be held annually in parallel to the Argentine Super Cup. which this year will be held on March 1.
In principle, it was supposed to be Boca-Patronato -champion of the Argentine Cup 2022- the match to be moved to the United Arab Emirates, but in the AFA he devised a new trophy and the final between “xeneizes” and Entre Ríos will take place in Argentina.
Everything that surrounds this match is very particular, such as the trip of both teams to the United Arab Emirates on the same flight. The situation was uncomfortable taking into account the history between the two teams in the final of the Champions Trophy in San Luis, on November 2.
Racing won that final 2-1, in extra time, and the match was suspended following 118 minutes following Boca suffered six expulsions (Darío Benedetto, Frank Fabra, Luis Advíncula, Alan Varela, Sebastián Villa and Diego González) and Racing three (Jonathan Galván, Carlos Carbonero and Carlos Alcaraz, who was sold to English Southampton).
Despite the expulsions, the AFA determined that the players who received the red card in San Luis will be able to participate in the final. To avoid inconveniences, the location of each campus was raffled on round trips. The one from Racing occupied the front part of the plane, the one from Boca in the rear sector and on the way back the places will be reversed.
The referees traveled on the same flight and luckily on the stopover in Madrid players from both teams greeted each other as professionals, leaving aside what happened two months ago. Regarding lodging, each campus stayed in a different hotel in the Emirates. Boca did it at Hili Rahyhaan, while Racing at Radisson Blue Al Rain, also having different fields to train.
Until now, Boca has played a triangular match with Independiente and Everton from Chile, equaling both matches without goals. For tomorrow coach Hugo Ibarra will have to decide who will make the cut since Agustín Rossi traveled, who has signed a pre-contract with Flamengo from Brazil, Sergio Romero, who is not physically flat, and Javier García.
In the defensive zone Boca does not have several injured such as Nicolás Figal and Marcos Rojo, and in the central defense Facundo Roncaglia and Agustín Sández will be present in the rear, while Ibarra would once more bet on Norberto Briasco as he did in San Luis, where he scored a goal.
As for the offense, the League champion team will face the commitment with its maximum potential, including the Colombian Sebastián Villa and Darío Benedetto.
Racing has two doubts due to an administrative delay since two of its reinforcements were not authorized, the Chilean striker Oscar Opazo and Maximilano Moralez, who returned to the club following passing through Europe and the United States.
If Opazo is not a starter, Iván Pillud will replace him and if Moralez does not, the options for coach Fernando Gago will go through Nicolás Oroz or Juan Nardoni, another reinforcement from Unión de Santa Fe.
= Probable formations =
Boca Juniors: Javier García or Agustín Rossi or Sergio Romero; Luis Advíncula, Facundo Roncaglia, Agustín Sández and Frank Fabra; Guillermo “Pol” Fernández, Alan Varela and Juan Ramírez; Norberto Briasco or Óscar Romero, Darío Benedetto and Sebastián Villa. DT: Hugo Ibarra.
Racing: Gabriel Arias; Oscar Opazo or Ivan Pillud, Leonardo Sigali, Emiliano Insúa and Gonzalo Piovi; Jonathan Gomez, Hannibal Moreno, Maximiliano Morales or Nicholas Oroz or Juan Nardoni; Gabriel Hauche, Maximilian Rosemary and Johan Carbonero. DT: Fernando Gago.
Referee: Fernando Rapallini.
Estadio: Hazza bin Zayed.
Hour: 12.30 from Argentina
TV: DSports (channels 610 and 1610) and Flow (channel 116).
