River cling on in Santiago to round off another eventful week for Argentine football

It's been an eventful week across Argentine football. Boca Juniors contrived to place coach Diego Martínez's position under even more threat by throwing away a winning position to lose away to Racing Club, who in turn snapped a concerning run of two games without wins nor goals to re-enter the Liga title race.

That race, though, is beginning to look like a procession. Vélez Sarsfield won yet again to move five points clear, taking advantage of Atlético Tucumán's defeat to River which handed Marcelo Gallardo his first league victory since returning, at the sixth attempt. Over in sunny Florida, meanwhile, and perhaps stung into action by watching all his Argentina team-mates having fun without him, Lionel Messi and his now regular-sized right ankle sauntered back into action and helped himself to two goals as Inter Miami breezed past Philadelphia.

There was even a bombshell from the famously hermetic halls of Viamonte, where Claudio Tapia not only managed to bring forward AFA's presidential elections a year but also ensured his name will be the only one on the ballot on October 17, which will keep him in charge of Argentine football until 2028 at the very earliest? A ‘Chiqui’ masterclass? Or a window into the sorry decadence of the power-brokers at the helm? This column says, why not both? And if all that were not enough, World Cup fever is back, albeit in reduced dimensions. The Argentina Futsal team, finalists three years ago, made a great start to their quest to retake the title with wins over Ukraine and Afghanistan, qualifying for the knockouts with a game to spare and raising hopes that ‘Muchaaaaachooooos’ will soon be sounding yet again.

But arguably the biggest match of the week was in the Libertadores, where River slog on as Argentina's sole remaining representative in the quarters. Gallardo and his team trekked to Santiago on Tuesday night to line up at another Monumental, this time the home of Chilean giants Colo Colo; a Monumental which, as the wags in charge of decorating for the first leg noted with a giant banner, knows nothing of relegations.

That vicious barb set the scene for 90 tetchy, ill-tempered minutes punctuated at times by passages of football. River took the lead just before half-time through Germán Pezzella's goal, but let it slip on the hour when a fine Colo Colo move combined with absent-minded defending allowed Carlos Palacios to slip through and finish past Franco Armani. Millo forward Miguel Borja was fortunate not to see red in the second half for a nasty stamping incident, while Paulo Díaz did receive his marching orders in a messy end to the game as did the extravagantly coiffured Maxi Falcón; the pair picking up yellow cards for fighting at consecutive corner kicks and then attempting to continue the scuffle into the Monumental tunnel.

All in all it was far from a vintage Gallardo Libertadores evening. River seemed surprised by the ferocity and intensity of their underdog opponent and were left chasing the ball for much of the game, a rarity in itself when it comes to one of el Muñeco's teams, while it took a couple of strong saves from Armani to keep the scoreline level. Nevertheless, the draw is not a bad result at all for the Millonario, who next week return to their own Monumental as red-hot favourites to advance to the semis – keeping alive the dream of a third Libertadores crown for Gallardo a matter of months after his return to the Núñez hotseat.