Papelón in Argentina: controversial participation of a streamer against the leader of the league!

Contrary to what happens with his world champion team, the argentine soccer keeps giving away unpresentable chapters. As if the local championship with 28 teams (which will be 30 next season), the relegations canceled with the competition near its end and the increasingly dubious arbitrations were not enough, now a team included a streamer in a key match of the league just for a marketing strategy, without any type of sports bra…

Iván Buhajeruk in the digital universe is Spreen, perhaps the most recognized Spanish-speaking streamer, with his 7,500,000 subscribers on YouTube, with his 5,400,000 followers on Instagram and with his recent jump from Twitch to Kick in exchange for a contract millionaire. He is 24 years old and has ties to the best brands. Now he has added a pearl that makes him different from everyone. He managed to make his debut in a First Division Argentine soccer team without being a soccer player, without having knowledge of the game, without even having a minimal trait of a player… He was chosen by the modest Deportivo Riestra, the club of eccentricities, only thinking about a strategy of marketing.

The influencer played with the number 47 on his back, in a key match against the leader of the league, against Vélez, a match that in the end concluded 1-1 and that with that result tightened and fueled the fight for that title with which Huracán (second at one point), Racing (third at 6) and River (fourth at 7, the same as Talleres and Unión) also dream.

Spreen played just over a minute with Deportivo Riestra for pure marketing

EFE

Spreen met with Riestra’s team and, from there, made a live broadcast in which he showed the personalized boots he would use and revealed the number that would identify him. When it came time to play, it was clear that he does not have a silhouette even close to that of a neat amateur player. He also revealed his poor ideas of positioning and other tactical issues. He was only on the field for one minute and 19 seconds. He ran without much sense. He didn’t touch any ball. His team committed an intentional foul quickly, to get the game stopped and replaced. And he walked towards the locker room accompanied by the applause of the small group of fans.

Soon, the story that Spreen starred in would break all social media metrics. And Riestra would celebrate it. The objective had been achieved. It is one more exotic idea for this soccer team that is going through its first year in the highest category of Argentine soccer.

Before Spreen, Deportivo Riestra had been the subject of its unlit stadium. Also for its main sponsor: Speed. The players enter the field drinking that energy drink, which appears in every corner of the stadium. Sometimes they drink it in the middle of a meeting. In the preview and in the breaks when they play at home, electronic music plays in the small stadium, under the command of a beautiful DJ.

A strategy that has given Riestra results

In January, in the middle of the Argentine summer, Riestra did the preseason to get ready in Pinamar, on the coast, in an exclusive place chosen by tourists, with quadruple shift work. One of those sessions was held at dawn, on the beach and next to crowded nightclubs. And of course, Riestra made the news! That was the goal…

Riestra, in his first season in the top category, managed to beat River, San Lorenzo and Independiente, and tied with Boca. He has football merits. But you also want to go viral, thinking about expanding your brand and generating greater income. That is why he also hired a young CM with many followers on social networks as press chief. That is why he made a 14-year-old young man debut in the First Division, which was a record in Argentine soccer and he never played again. That’s why he brought in Jaime Barceló, a professional goalkeeper with more than 600,000 followers on TikTok and more than 60,000 subscribers on YouTube. And now Spreen…

Spreen played and generated controversy in Argentina

EFE

Cristian Fabbiani, Riestra’s coach, said that when he took over Spreen already had his contract signed. Later, his concern was the change he was losing. He chose to include him as a starter, so as not to depend on the result of the game if he put him at the end. And before the match he approached the rival coach, Gustavo Quinteros, to explain that the inclusion of Spreen was not to belittle Vélez. “It’s marketing, it helps the club a lot. We wanted to win the serve, to throw the ball out and make the change. But they won the toss, so we tried to end the game quickly, with a foul,” explained Fabbiani.

Of course, what sounds natural to Riestra generated multiple questions in Argentine soccer. One of the toughest was precisely a Spreen rival, Braian Romero, Vélez forward, author of the penalty that opened the 1-1 against Deportivo Riestra, top scorer in the league with 12 shouts. “It was a lack of respect for football. Today the TV showed the kids a shortcut and it’s not that one. What has happened is a wrong message to society, to the kids and to those who try to the last… Today I had to see a team in the Olympic Village (Vélez’s training and concentration place) with kids who had gone to try out and they left sad because they weren’t in the club. That’s football: trying until the end, leaving your family, traveling hours to play… What we show today is the wrong message for the kids who come from below. “That is not the way.”