Argentine football fan jailed for threats over Di Maria return

Sign InSportsArgentine football fan jailed for threats over Di Maria returnBy Stacy Boit · October 31, 2026 · 2 min readSponsored AdAn Argentine court in Rosario has sentenced 45-year-old Sergio Di Vanni to seven and a half years in prison for orchestrating a violent campaign of intimidation against 2022 World Cup winner Ángel Di María and his family.

The court found Di Vanni guilty of ordering acts of harassment in March 2024 to prevent the winger from returning to Argentina to join a rival football club.

At the time of the threats, Di María was playing for Portuguese club SL Benfica but was publicly evaluating a return to his boyhood team, Rosario Central.

Di Vanni, linked to cross-town rivals Newell’s Old Boys, sought to block the move through targeted intimidation, which included gunshots fired near Di María’s family property and threatening messages left for his relatives.

Although the security concerns initially delayed his homecoming, the former Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain star ultimately completed his move back to Rosario Central in 2025 to finish his professional career.

The campaign of intimidation stemmed from the intense local rivalry between Rosario Central and Newell’s Old Boys—the childhood club of Lionel Messi—which share a long-standing and fierce footballing feud in the city of Rosario.

The threats directed at Di María were severe, including gunshots fired near his residence in a gated community and a severed pig’s head bearing a bullet wound dumped outside his sister’s real estate agency, accompanied by a direct message threatening his daughter.

Legal proceedings against the co-conspirators have already yielded multiple convictions.

In June, 25-year-old Belén Gutiérrez was sentenced to three and a half years in prison after entering a guilty plea for her role in executing the harassment.

Prosecutors revealed that Gutiérrez and a second suspect—who currently remains in pre-trial detention—were hired to carry out the intimidation tactics in exchange for four million pesos ($2,600).

According to the prosecution, the intimidation campaign was linked to an internal power struggle among Newell’s ultras. Di Vanni’s sentence also covered separate offences related to his involvement in the supporters’ group.

Following the threats, Di Maria initially abandoned plans to return to Argentina for the safety of his family.

He ultimately reversed that decision and, now 38, has spent the past two seasons at Rosario Central, helping the club win the Argentine title at the end of 2025.