Sometimes a football match feels less like a sporting event and more like a season finale of Breaking Bad—the kind where you know chaos is coming, but half the thrill is not knowing how. That’s what’s cooking at Estadio La Independencia this Saturday night, where Chico and Santa Fe roll in for a match that might as well be titled: “Relegation, Redemption, and Regrets.” We’re not talking about a glitzy clásico, but trust me, this is appointment viewing. This is pure, high-stakes, edge-of-the-seat football—Colombian style.

Let’s set the scene: Chico sits in 19th place—12 points from 14 games, the kind of record that gets you a starring role in a relegation docuseries, if anyone bothered to film it. Two wins, six draws, and six losses, with a meager 0.4 goals per game over their last ten matches. To paraphrase The Godfather: It’s not personal, it’s strictly business. And business, for Chico, is going under. But beware: desperation has a funny way of making the underdog bite back, especially in front of their home crowd, desperate for a spark, a hero, or at least a reason to believe.

Santa Fe, on the other hand, is teetering on the edge—eighth in the table, 20 points, clinging onto playoff dreams with the white knuckles of a guy on a rollercoaster who’s suddenly remembered he hates heights. The Leones are a perennial power… but after back-to-back losses, including a home thumping from Llaneros and a humbling cup exit to Independiente Medellin, this squad suddenly feels more fragile than an Alliance of Westeros in Season 8.

If you’re a Santa Fe diehard, you’re haunted by the inconsistency: one week dismantling La Equidad 3-0, next week leaking goals and spirit. The eternal question: which Santa Fe turns up? Will it be Hugo Rodallega, the ageless fox in the box with the poacher’s touch, bossing around the 18-yard like it’s his living room? Or the version of Santa Fe that forgets how to defend set-pieces and concedes goals like they’re giving out Halloween candy?

Chico, for all their struggles, have lately started to show a little stubbornness. Sure, the 5-2 collapse at Once Caldas and the 4-0 pasting from Deportes Tolima stung like Joffrey’s slap to Tyrion, but there are kernels of hope. Johan Bocanegra, the one bright spark in a cloud of gray, has snatched late goals for crucial draws—his equalizer against Nacional was pure willpower. And Jairo Molina, when not marooned in attack, shows flashes that he still remembers where the goal is. This is less a team, more a ragtag group of survivors—think the cast of Lost after the plane crash, trying to remember how to work together before the Smoke Monster (relegation) gets them.

Tactically, you know the blueprints. Chico will bunker down, draw the lines deep, and try to frustrate—think Die Hard’s John McClane, outgunned but never outwitted on home turf. They’ll absorb and counter, leaning on Molina to hold up play and on Bocanegra’s late runs—like a Hail Mary pass with everything on the line.

Santa Fe, if they’re smart, play this match on the front foot, controlled aggression. Omar Fernández and Alexis Zapata should be probing the channels, dragging Chico’s compact backline all over the shop, while Christian Mafla bombs forward—maybe a little too eagerly, as he loves to do—and Rodallega looks to exploit any momentary lapse. Santa Fe rarely go full throttle for 90 minutes, but their best moments this year have come when they’re fearless, taking risks and swarming in midfield.

The battle in the center is going to be prime-time drama. Chico need to slow it way down, grind it out, “Game of Thrones” in the mud at Winterfell style. Santa Fe want to speed it up, get the game open, maybe draw out Chico’s fullbacks and hit them with a late runner to the back post. This is less chess, more poker—who blinks first?

Now, what’s actually at stake? For Santa Fe, anything less than three points and their playoff chase starts to look shakier than a sitcom’s third season. Chico? Everything is at stake—dignity, survival, and the difference between another year in the big league or a slow, painful drop into the abyss.

So what’s going to happen? Honestly, this smells like drama. Chico’s only shot is to keep things ugly, force Santa Fe to play with nerves, and hope Bocanegra or Molina can steal something off a set-piece or a rare counter. But Santa Fe, with Rodallega’s experience and the firepower on the wings, should have enough to get the job done—if they don’t let the ghosts of recent stumbles haunt them.

But don’t blink. One slip, one moment of magic, and the whole story could flip. If there’s one thing football (and television) has taught us, it’s that the underdog is most dangerous when everyone already wrote the script for them. So grab your popcorn—this could be the night Chico throws out the script and writes their own ending. After all, in football and in life, as Rocky once said, “It ain’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.” Chico’s about to find out if they still have that in them.