Alex Valera, the day the life of the best Peruvian striker in the championship changed

Mid-2021. For various reasons —responsibility, weight, shirt—, alex valera He did not repeat games like the Cup for months, a premiere summer where he scored two goals. They are the collateral damage of a chaotic U. The arrival of Gregorio Pérez generated in Valera the same thing that happens to us when our grandfather comes home: he gives you answers, he calms you down, he hugs you. The former Universitario coach detected that Alex was accelerated: he wanted to do everything at once but that speed exposed him. The U played without people on the field but in the networks, where wisdom boils: there the stands become a court.

Then the crisis breaks out: Valera misses a penalty against San Martín. It’s September, damn spring. In the locker room, already on Monday, Gregorio looks for him and asks him to calm down. He also tells her that from now on Quina is going to kick penalties. That he is already spoken in the group. I don’t know if he is the correct text, but he speaks something like: “It’s okay, Alex. Go ahead. I trust you, but you need to release cargo. And you’re going to see that now that you don’t kick penalties you’re going to eat the goal”. And that’s where the streak began. A few days later, in a meeting with Jean Ferrari, they agree that he was the 9 holder of the ‘U’ for 2022, a message that is made public at the end of the tournament. Another endorsement for a striker with a strange biography, who only played and taught beach soccer four years ago in China, who watched the Gareca team on TV back in Pomalca, his homeland; that he trains every day as if in every routine he was saving his fifth generation,

And well, he will.

Alex Valera closed Liga 1 2021 with 11 goals. He scored two more in his first Libertadores. And another two more in the last friendlies of the selection last year. In his stay at the club, beyond not having been champion, he already has a title: with 43 games he has scored 22 goals -one goal every two games on average-, he is the best striker in the local championship. The ‘U’ did not have a local 9 of that size, opportunistic and timely, since Johan Fano, when Gareca did not have gray hair. On Saturday, double in the 3-1 against San Martín, he celebrated with rage and joy, that is, with euphoria, and left a lesson that applies to everything, and more so to ours: in bad times, which will be many, there are what to hug It is at that moment where a hug is worth a thousand. And maybe I’m falling short, because I understand that in December and before any possibility of negotiating, the ‘U’ will not sit down to negotiate for less than US$ 1 million.

In other words, sometimes nothing else is needed.