Paolo Guerrero and the importance of reaching a champion team | OPINION

Although there were those who were already writing their memoirs, Paolo Guerrero is one signature away from fulfilling a teenage wish: play in Argentine soccer. Consuelo Vargas, the newspaper’s beloved photographer, took the first photos of him before the Bolivarians in 2000 and there she listened to what he and his compadre, a pubescent Jefferson Farfán, were talking about. She told me once: “How nice it must be to play in Argentina.”

Well, it’s coming to pass. As reported by ESPN, right at the halftime of Boca Racing for the final of the Argentine International Super Cup – there in Dubai, the new Dorado of world football -, the historic scorer of the Peruvian team will go to Racing Club, the team where the 9 only They know how to be idols: Piojo López, Diego Milito, Lautaro Martínez. Then, without any official confirmation from Avellaneda, the journalist Juan Pablo Varsky went further and tweeted: “Paolo Guerrero will reinforce Racing. He will arrive in the country in the next few hours and, after passing the medical examination, he will sign his contract with the institution”.

Where does Paolo arrive, retired almost for half a Peruvian critic? In principle, to a champion club. It is not the same to reach a mid-table club than one in full swing. Captain Iván Pillud, after beating Boca in Dubai, explained it better: “We won a title at the end of the year, we won another at the beginning. That’s what this group needs.”

This club, in addition, which proposes a transversal project towards its minor divisions that the brothers Catriel and Axel Cabellos enjoy, among many, is led by Fernando Gago, a historic footballer from the Argentine milieu. Someone who also knows about injuries and the importance of timing returns, taking care of forms, protecting the footballer. He experienced it firsthand: in three years he tore his Achilles tendon twice and then his cruciate ligament. If anyone is going to guide him better than anyone, despite the fact that Paolo is injury-free today, it’s him.

Addition and subtraction done, this is great news. Test its validity and the very high fence that its environment puts on it. Without local football, with the under 20s beaten and an adult team that prays that its greatest figure finds a team -Cuevita-, the signing of Paolo Guerrero at the age of 39 forces us to recognize that, perhaps in this case, we were being a bit ungrateful . If Racing wants it, the most champion of the last five months of Argentine soccer, how can we not want it.

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