Copa America Semi-Finals

My housemates and I decided to go to the Copa America Semi-finals on Wednesday night to see Venezuela play against Paraguay. It was actually the first soccer game I’ve ever gone to, despite the fact I lived in Sevilla, Spain for six months (shameful, I know) so I wasn’t sure what to expect or even how to go about getting tickets.

For this particular game, we knew Chileans would be trying to scalp their tickets since Chile didn’t make it to the semi-finals as they had hoped. We started walking to the stadium at 5:30 p.m. the day of the game and didn’t even make it a block before three people offered to sell us tickets. We bargained to pay half price (100 pesos) and as a bonus, our seller said he would give us a ride to the game as well.

However, to buy a ticket directly you can also go to Ticketek or to the stadium ticket office. Hint: Careful buying scalped tickets. Apparently, if you rip the corner of the ticket and it’s red, then it’s a real ticket.

For this particular game, it wasn’t important to arrive early.  In fact, it was very odd to be at the Copa America semi-final game and see the stadium half full, if that, and unfortunately, the game was pretty uneventful (no goals). However, the crowd of Chileans, who apparently were unable to sell their tickets, were quite entertaining. They broke out into spontaneous cheers for Chile, nevermind the fact that Chile wasn’t playing. There was also a heavyset man running around with the Chilean flag for the majority of the game.

As you might expect, there were very few women in the crowd; it will probably be one of the only instances in which the men’s bathroom is more crowded than the women’s. As you might NOT expect, they only serve non-alcoholic beer at the stadiums. My boyfriend quickly canceled his order when he found out. The only food they serve is hot dogs and hamburgers and for drinks, coffee and soda. That said, I saw several people bring food in; I was very surprised that both at the stadium and at the movie theaters in Mendoza, you can bring your own food.

 

Finally, my last impression was that for whatever reason, penalty kicks are less tense to watch in person than on t.v. I usually can hardly watch them at my house, but at the stadium, it was no big deal. But that might have to do with the freezing temperatures. Overall, I would highly recommend going to any games in Mendoza if you have the chance.