Calleri returned to La Bombonera after eleven years and was booed throughout

It took Jonathan Calleri eleven years to set foot on the grass at La Bombonera again. And the welcome was exactly what anyone could have pictured: whistles from the first minute, though he'd already made peace with it before he even stepped off the bus.

The forward, now captain and a key figure at Sao Paulo, returned to the Boca Juniors stadium for the Copa Sudamericana quarterfinals, played this September 8, 2026. As soon as he came out to check the field, mixed in among his teammates on the stairway near the Casa Amarilla goal, the fans already filling the stands greeted him with the same hostility reserved for any opponent. Nothing personal, on the surface, though with Calleri this chapter carried an extra edge.

When the announcer read out the Sao Paulo lineup, the forward's name was practically swallowed up by whistle after whistle. It wasn't until the 80th minute, when Calleri left the field, that La Bombonera made its feelings toward its former player unmistakably clear: jeers and pointed insults, with no attempt to hide them.

"I know what I did here"

Once the match ended, Calleri didn't hold back. There was no surprise, no bitterness, just the calm of someone who already knows the terrain.

I have no problem with it, I know what I did here.Jonathan Calleri

Before the reunion, he'd already made his position clear, with no sugarcoating: he'd declared himself a Sao Paulo fan, something that, let's just say, didn't go down well in Nunez. Even so, he'd hinted the matchup stirred something in him.

I've been living this story for 10 years and I'm very happy here. But this is a very special game for me.Jonathan Calleri

From the rabona goal to more than 260 matches in Brazil

Calleri arrived at Boca in 2014 and didn't have his path handed to him: he had to earn his place. It was actually Rodolfo Arruabarrena, now sitting on that same Boca bench, who gave him his first chance. The forward answered with 61 matches, 23 goals and 12 assists, on top of winning a domestic league title and the Copa Argentina in 2015. From that stretch, one image still circulates: the rabona goal against Quilmes in July 2015, with Carlos Tevez freshly arrived at the club and Diego Maradona watching from the stands.

Then came the move to Sao Paulo and a European run through West Ham, Las Palmas, Alaves, Espanyol and Osasuna, before he returned to the Brazilian club, where he's now played more than 260 matches. A long decade that made him captain and a true point of reference for Sao Paulo fans, something he himself acknowledged plainly before this matchup.

Truth is, whistles aside, the result of the tie took a back seat to this particular story. Calleri came back, played, heard what he had to hear, and left with the same calm he arrived with.