Basile Goes Out In Style

Champions of Argentina, Boca Juniors, won the Recopa Sudamericana last night after drawing 2-2 away to Sao Paulo in the second-leg. Boca had won at the Bombonera last week 2-1 to take the series 4-3 on aggregate. The win was Boca's 16th international title, a world record and one more than European giants AC Milan and Real Madrid.

The win also meant the end of the road at Boca for coach Alfio Basile. He will go on to coach the Argie national team full time as they prepare for next summer's Copa America in Venezuela. South America's World Cup qualifiers are slated to begin in the fall of 2008.

Ricardo La Volpe officially took over as coach at Boca today, making declarations that he would not change how things were run at the league-leaders. Keep note of this information when the team loses for the first time.

Boca pull off world record victory [CNN]
Lavolpe promises little change at Boca [Fox Sports]


In other Latin American news:

Captain Riquelme quits Argentina [BBC]
Crespo complains of lack of respect [World Soccer]
Warner to face FIFA rap [ESPN Soccernet]
Scaloni joins Santander [Eurosport]
Boca call for "severe sanctions" on Gimnasia's president [International Herald Tribune]
At least they're playing well in one competition [Guardian UK]
Toluca's unbeaten run ends with 1-0 loss to San Luis [Sports Illustrated]
Brazilian national team news: building 2014 venues and promoting peace [World Cup Blog and SLAM! Sports]
Banished to Israel [Yahoo!]

-ac