Mark, Andrew, Brad and I went to the Mexico vs Argentina game at Qualcomm Stadium last night. The game was a lot of fun, how could it not be when you’re surrounded by 68,498 excited fans (a San Diego futbol record they tell us). We got to see Lionel Messi play, and score a goal. There were a ton more Mexico fans there than Argentina (to be expected). But there were some Argentina fans, I wore my jersey and didn’t get *too* much shit from the Mexico fans. One guy even came up to us before the game while we were waiting in line to get in, he was wearing a Mexico jersey and holding a flag and started chanting Argentina, I was taken aback a bit but then realized he was being a bit too friendly and his “Argentina” quickly turned into a chant of “Chinga tu madre!”, but all with a smile on his face.
I taught Mark an Argentine insult (thanks Pablo and Jorge!) which he kept repeating and I was sure he was going to get us killed. I also had a fun experience in the bathroom at halftime, there was a long line, I waited, went to the urinal, did my thing, then turned around and started walking out, I was greeted by at least 50 men in line chanting “Puto! Puto!” as I walked out (but again, all with smiles on their faces).
One thing I really enjoyed about the game was that all of the announcements and nearly everything on the screen was in Spanish, I thought that was pretty cool.
It was a lot of fun, I dont know that I’ve ever seen Qualcomm Stadium that full, and never that full of energy. Soccer is probably my favorite sport to watch, because it is so fast paced, with very few breaks in the action — which also means very few opportunities for commercial breaks, which is one of the reasons I think it isn’t nearly as popular in the US as everywhere else in the world.
