Mauro Ortiz received the ball at the height of the crescent, controlled it, finished with his right foot and established the 1-0 in favor of Riestra against Vélez at 23 minutes into the first half. The shout of goal rang loudly throughout the Villa Soldati neighborhood. The hugs between their fans were not the same as always, they had much more passion and emotion under the rays of sun that shone in the city of Buenos Aires. Perhaps it is one more story for this club that was born back in 1931 and was stripped of its original place by the dictatorship. However, it was much more: the team that was promoted to first division on December 2 and that played in all categories of Argentine soccer, scored its first goal in history in the First Division.
“Riestra is family,” he tells THE NATION a fan wearing a black t-shirt advertising an energy drink, famous for being the property of Victor Stinfale, the lawyer who arrived at Deportivo Riestra in 2013, with the team in the First D, the fourth category of Argentine soccer. From there, the club began to grow. “At the first board meeting he told us that in 10 years he had not put it in first gear. We looked at him and thought he was crazy,” says a supporter, who had the good fortune to play in the first team and even achieve promotion.
And if there is something that all Malevo fans agree on, it is that having the businessman inside the institution is a positive thing: “I say it’s crazy beautiful. Here we had nothing, there was a horse. There were even parties to raise funds. Thanks to him we now have all this.” Today, the picture is completely different. More stands and a VIP box with a DJ that gives it a nighttime atmosphere. The AFA authorized Riestra to play in its stadium, despite not meeting the regulatory requirements and the reasons were explained by a member of the City Government.
In recent years and even a few days ago, the club was targeted by public opinion by the controversial arbitration rulings in his favor. But their fans do not feel comfortable with that figure: “They have been saying it since we have been in B, we already see it as something normal. “Football is 11 against 11, but whenever something happens to us, they are going to go for our jugular.”
Fernanda is 39 years old, she is a fan of the club and has always followed it. “We came from very low. We had a dirt field, there were no stands, there was nothing. As we rose, everything improved a lot,” she says at the beginning. Then she revealed: “Before there was a horse and there were also parties for the Bolivian community, the property was rented to raise funds and do works.” Regarding this, Manuel, a member of the club for many years, adds: “Here in Fernández de la Cruz and Varela, the Bolivian and virgin communities come together because they represent the neighborhood, there are many celebrations of people who are devout and lent them the property. for that at one time, all in order to raise money. The club was social, with older people who played cards at the headquarters on Del Bañado and Avenida Riestra streets, it was formed from below and little by little it grew.”
Regarding the history of the club, everyone agrees. “We are a small club, which has always been in minor divisions. I grew up around the corner from the club headquarters, I played in the youth teams and also for six years in the first division, in the D, and I was lucky enough to achieve a promotion to the C,” he tells THE NATION Fernando Renú, who has much more to add.
Deportivo Riestra had a sad moment in the years of the last military dictatorship. During the administration of Osvaldo Cacciatore, the stadium was on Avenida Lacarra and Avenida Riestra, very close to the stronghold of his classic, Deportivo Sacachispas. But by a plan of the Urban Planning Code, in 1977, the state expropriated the land and removed the club from its place of origin to build the AU7 Western highway, which since 2002 has been named after Héctor J. Campora. Finally, this route was built many years later and does not even pass through where the old stadium was, but rather next to it. However, Renú highlights: “Thanks to the efforts made by several partners and leaders, the new house arrived in 1992.” Located within Almirante Brown Park, in an area of subdivided land in which there are many sports facilities, the current field is located, just 15 blocks from the previous one, on the corner of Ana María Janer Street and Varela Avenue. Small and humble, its neighbor is the immense Nuevo Gasómetro de San Lorenzo.
After many years wandering between C, D and even disaffiliation, It was in 2013 that the image of Víctor Stinfale appeared in Deportivo Riestra. The renowned lawyer was the one who took the reins of the club, which from then on did not stop growing. “The only two requirements that were asked for him to start working were that he not change the name or colors of the club. At the first meeting of the Board of Directors he said that in ten years he would put us in First Class. Everyone looked at him as if saying that he was crazy, and he didn’t comply, because we came first in eleven″, Renú recalls with a smile.
Everyone thinks the same about the arrival of the businessman and lawyer. “He is crazy beautiful, he is positive, he gave us many things as a property, from having nothing to having all this, with the covered baby soccer field and the auxiliary field. We are very happy with his arrival,” says Fernanda along with her 17-year-old son Santiago, who is also accompanied by little Thiago. Manuel also thinks about Stinfale: “he gave a spectacular imprint to the club, this has its process, I like that he is there, apart from that he is the one who put Riestra in the place that we didn’t even dream of.”
The Guillermo Laza stadium grew a lot from the beginning of the 90s until 2024. “How it happened was crazy, there was nothing here, everything was empty,” say Juan Pablo and María. But with the help of Stinfale he began to have a stall on one of the sides. Below it, first-level locker rooms to receive first division teams. Also, two small stands behind each arch. And on the other side, a charming VIP box was built that houses journalists, relatives of the visiting teams and VIP guests. All decorated with artificial plants on the walls and with refrigerators containing cans of the famous energy drink, the club’s main sponsor, whose logo can be seen in every corner of the stadium. As an eccentric corollary, a booth in which a live DJ sets a festive atmosphere with electronic music at full volume and just a few meters from the playing field.
It is worth noting that the stadium does not have sufficient requirements to be enabled for First Division matches to be played. However, engineer Marcelo Mujica, belonging to the AGC (government control agency of the City of Buenos Aires), explains why the AFA gave the go-ahead for the newly promoted team to use its stage: “It is a stadium with precarious and provisional facilities, for now, which do not exceed 3,000 places, but the AFA allows the club to gain experience and raise funds to have increases in its infrastructure and be able to get closer to the regulations they establish,” he expressed.
One of the topics that Deportivo Riestra focused on the most in recent years and also in recent days was the arbitrations: “Whenever something happens with Riestra they go for our jugular,” says Juan Pablo. Many of those who know the ins and outs of the promotion point to the team managed by Víctor Stinfale as one of the most benefited in Argentine football. “It’s ungrateful,” Fernando Renú complains. “What is woven behind closed doors, no one will know.” Furthermore, he elaborates: “Argentine football has always been in doubt: it is ‘this one’s mafia’ or ‘that one’s mafia’.” He also emphasized the situation that the team went through in the duel for the Argentine Cup against Comunicaciones, which ended in a scandal due to a controversial penalty in the last minute: “The referee exposed himself uselessly, in the first half he did not charge us a penalty that it was, then at the end of the game he gave a penalty that wasn’t.” On the other hand, Fernanda and Santiago assure: “We see it as something normal because they have been saying it since we were in B.”
Meanwhile, despite having scored the first goal in the first division in its entire history, Vélez was able to reverse the match and victory in big football for Riestra is still something to be desired. After five rounds, Malevo only saved one point against Instituto on the first round of the League Cup and even suffered a change of coach. Cristian Fabbiani replaced Matías Módolo, the coach who achieved promotion. Beyond everything, in his first experience in big football in Argentina, the phrase of one of the plateistas reflects the feelings of all Riestra’s supporters: “We are a humble club that comes from the D and we try to make the most of “All this that we are experiencing.”
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