Coach from Barcelona Sporting goes viral after showing up in a tuxedo to a Libertadores match

Barcelona Sporting Club, one of the most successful Ecuadorian football clubs, earned a big win over Brazilian club Corinthians in the third round of Copa Libertadores, the top club competition in South America: 3-0. The victory gets them very close to qualifying for the group stage of the continental competition, which will take place between April and May, with the knockout stages between August and October, and the final on November 29.

Barcelona has a long way to go before that. The few Ecuadorian clubs that pass the qualifying phases rarely survive beyond the group stages, although Barcelona is one of the most successful, reaching semi-finals in 2021 and 2017. The most recent winner from the country is Liga de Quito in 2008.

However, the thing that caught the eye of many people, and not just fans, was the tuxedo that the coach, Segundo Castillo (former Everton and Wolverhampton Wanderers player), wore to the match. It has been turned into a lot of respectful memes, including turning him into James Bond.

Why is an Ecuadorian club named after Barcelona?

Despite the name and the emblem, it is not affiliated to FC Barcelona. However, when it was founded exactly 100 years ago, many of the founding members were from Barcelona, and they had the majority vote to name the club Barcelona Sporting Club, instead of Deportivo Astillero, the name of the neighbourhood in Guayaquil.

In fact, Barcelona Sporting just beat Corinthians, who employs a former Barça player: Memphis Depay.

Barcelona SC has won Ecuadorian Serie A a record 16 times, the last one in 2020, and was twice finalist of the Libertadores, in 1990 and 1998.