Last Saturday, before the biggest grudge match in international soccer, Spanish police officers decked out in riot gear surrounded my Barcelona hotel. Blue lights bounced from the sun-stained stone of the alley as kids scrambled away in the distance. In the skirmish, one had lost a single ASICS sneaker that sat idly in the road until, sometime between night and the light of day, someone snatched it up for themselves. You often hear of the way heated football rivalries and cup finals bring out a kind of mob mentality among fans. The match, however, wasn’t set to kick off for another 24 hours.

Three days prior I’d landed in Barcelona to attend FC Barcelona versus Real Madrid, better known as El Clásico, for which Tyler the Creator’s GOLF brand had partnered with Spotify on Barcelona’s gameday kits. If you care about football in the slightest you know about El Clásico, though it’s worth knowing about even if you don’t.

Since 1902—the year of Real Madrid’s founding, and three years after that of FC Barcelona—the two biggest football clubs in Spain have clashed in a rivalry match dubbed El Clásico (the face-off now happens twice a season, plus various tournament play that varies in schedule year to year). Before last week’s installment, the match had been played 264 times over 122 years. In most high-stakes football rivalries, one club holds a historical edge: Arsenal has a handy 20 to 30 wins over Tottenham Hotspur in the North London Derby, depending on when you start keeping track, while Manchester United edges out Liverpool in total wins. But heading into the first El Clásico of the 2026-27 La Liga season, Barcelona and Real Madrid stood deadlocked with 106 wins each.