AS Roma v El Salvador Friendly last friday in NY

So I went to the "friendly" at Red Bull Arena last friday. I suppose, after watching years of the USMNT play sides like El Salvador, I was a bit more prepared for chaos but it was still a bit crazier than I expected.

The scene was around 15k wasted El Salvadorians who'd seemingly been tailgating all day in the broiling dirt parking lots and about a thousand Roma fans. Osvaldo scored around 3 minutes into the match and from that point forward any semblance of friendliness vanished.

Water bottles, shoes, half eaten apples consistently showered any Roma player that dared come near a sideline. Skirmishes erupted everywhere with the few hundred Roma fans that hadn't realized sitting anywhere but the Roma section was a prescription for disaster. Beer soaked and bruised, they all quickly relocated to the Roma curve in time for fat El Salvadorians to run drunkenly onto the pitch and try to moon the Roma section before security guards tackled them and fought them into the tunnels.

By the 70th minute, it seemed that a majority of the biggest trouble makers had been removed when a hard tackle by Tachtsisdis was met with a head butt to the chin from an El Salvadorian player. Under a shower of the few shoes and fruit that had been held aside for just such an opportunity, Tachtsidis lost it and all 6'4" 220 of him managed to throw half his teammates and 2 officials aside on his way to spiking the head butter into the turf and officializing his spot on the AS Roma roster with a friendly red card.

Outside of the stadium, both before and after the match, the El Salvadorian fans were pretty mellow and there were no incidents that I witnessed at all. However, kickoff to final whistle, I have to credit them on bringing their A game.