The year 1916 was passing, when the Cup was played for the first time, which, at that time, was called South American National Team Championship. Only in 1975 did it change its name to America Cupin which only teams from the South American Football Confederation (Conmebol).
This first edition was held between July 2 and 17 to celebrate 100 years of Argentina’s independenceand the invited selections were those of Brazil, Chile and Uruguaywhich played alongside the hosts in Buenos Aires.
Over the years, there are several curious cases that have been presented in this mythical contest.
It was precisely the Argentine National Team the one that suffered an unusual event in that first edition that went down in history,
At that time the teams had to present their eleven players in order to start playing the match and no changes were allowed, nor were there yellow or red cards, as today.
Argentina was going to be measured with Brazil on July 10, from 2:30 p.m., on the Gimnasia y Esgrima court in Buenos Aires and, a while before starting the match, the Argentine coach received unexpected news that could end the elimination in the tournament.
One of the figures of the Albiceleste team, Racing forward, Alberto Ohaco, could not arrive in time to play this South American classic.
Faced with this unforeseen event, the Argentine team had no other alternative but to resort to the stands to find an improvised replacement for Ohaco and not be eliminated in the second match.
The eyes of all the players scanned the stands desperately until one of them was able to recognize among the 20,000 spectators José Laguna, footballer who played for Huracán.
Laguna immediately accepted the invitation, dressed in the Argentine colors and precisely, after 10 minutes he put the national team ahead.
However, the Argentine joy was short-lived, since 13 minutes later Alencar scored 1-1 for the Brazilians, a result that would end the match.
Another unusual event that occurred was that the judge of the match was Luis Carlos Fanta Tomaszewski, a Chilean soccer player, soccer coach, referee, sports leader and pharmaceutical chemist.
Finally, Uruguay was the champion after drawing 0-0 against Argentina, in a match that was played on July 16 at the Racing field.
Source: Ambito
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