And I think the youth ranks are more important than you’re giving them credit for. The clubs survive because of (or, for River, end up in baffling amounts of debt in spite of) bringing their own talent through and selling it on to more financially powerful clubs in Europe and Asia. The most important aspect of the domestic game certainly isn’t marketing (there’s very little), or the financial clout that comes with it.

It’s impossible not to generalise on this subject, but broadly speaking, the ’smaller’ clubs (by and large, those you might not have heard of before you started reading my columns / website) bring young players through their ranks and sell to each other. River and Boca can cream off the best of those, and most transfers to Europe will go from either those two or the other ‘Big Five’ clubs. There are some qualifiers to this. Velez and River, for instance, are both particularly well-regarded for their youth systems, whilst Boca tend to buy players very young from other sides and bring them through the reserves (the list of players the wider world thinks of as Boca though-and-through, who in fact started out elsewhere, is a very long one).

Foreigners do also play in the league - at present we’ve got Colombians Radamel Falcao García at River, Jairo Patiño at Banfield and Freddy Grisales at Independiente, Chilean Alexis Sánchez at River and any number of Uruguayans and Paraguayans (one of whom, Julio Cesar Cáceres, recently joined the ranks of the incredibly brave or the incredibly stupid when, having played for River a few years ago, he signed for Boca in January).

So Argentina and Brazil take the best players from the continent’s other leagues, River and Boca take the best from elsewhere in the Argentine league, and then the very best go off to Europe, inevitably - sometimes, like Riquelme or D’Alessandro, to return after getting homesick or falling out with a manager, often to establish themselves in their new homelands. And that all starts with the youth development…

I’ll be honest i don’t know too much about the set up, but i’ve always enjoyed watching the games, as they are exciting and the fans seem to be some of the best in the world - what passion! Riquelme moving back was a clincher for me, as he was always one of my favourite players.

So what i suppose i’m asking, from what pools do the clubs take the players from? Are most of them from youth ranks, or are they poached from ‘lesser’ South or Central American countries?

I really sympathise with Racing. Villa and Spurs are both traditionally very big clubs in England (both have had domestic and Europena success) and for big clubs to go down is always upsetting, as by and large thye have the best support (history = support).

One further question/request: What’s going on with the olympics? What are the feelings of the fans/players towards it? And what foreign based players are set to be involved?

Not just tonight, they’ve been screwed by a few calls this season. They’re down already. Newspaper reports that I’ve been reading seem to show that team as down before the season even began.

I’m not even sure about Spurs. They’re bigger, in Argentina, than Spurs are in England. Historically they’re an Aston Villa kind of club, but with a more notable fanbase that’s as dedicated as (and as a United fan it pains me to say this) Manchester City’s.The biggest worry for them has to be that B Nacional is a very competitive division indeed. This wouldn’t be Juventus going down to Serie B, or even comparable with Corinthians’ recent relegation in Brazil. If Racing go down, it’s by no means a given that they’ll be coming straight back up.

This evening, they were 1-0 up against Boca in La Bombonera, and were easily the better team. Then Boca got an equaliser following a clear handball, seen by everyone except the ref. That was followed by a winning goal from a debutant substitute, with almost the last touch, at the end of five minutes of stoppage time. There’s no way they’re escaping the relegation playoffs with that kind of luck.

Vamos Acade!