Call: Why does the Reynoso team still have the usual thirty-somethings?

El Cabezón is not a magician, he is a selector. And you can’t build mud players or hand over the shirt to any boy whose main credential is being a figure in our prestigious League 1. That’s why the list for the start of the 2026 North American qualifiers will surely be completed with well-known thirty-somethings and some of the Sub 23 collagens that will later pass under the orders of Chemo (Grimaldo, perhaps Quispe). Ricardo Gareca would have done the same and if his replacement had been a foreigner, sign that the story would be the same. And not for succumbing to the misnamed ring, but because as Claudio Pizarro once said -perhaps in his happiest intervention with the national team shirt- “it is what it is”.

The skeleton is the same and – damn it! – we know it by heart: Gallese, Advíncula, Callens, López, Trauco, Yotún, Tapia, Aquino, Carrillo, Flores, Cueva (despite their unbridled passion for water from barley), Reyna and the resurrected Guerrero. If for those of us who navigated base five before it was a show of pride to repeat teams by heart (I still think that the eleven that Tim stopped in Montevideo -Quiroga; Duarte, Chumpi, Panadero, Rojitas; Cueto, Velásquez, Uribe; Patrulla, La Rosa and Oblitas- is the best in history), today is a demonstration of lack of replacement and leadership paralysis. Where are our Caicedos, our Encisos, our Julián Álvarez? The best foreigner in League 1 is a very good Brazilian player, Ignacio, but a very discreet player in football in his country. While Rodrigo Ureña steals applause at the Monumental, he can’t find a place in the Chilean team. And Pablo Sabbag, the Colombian who left the Alianza fans speechless at the beginning of the season, today spends more time in the infirmary than on the Matute green.

WITHOUT FORWARDS

On Friday, Reynoso was full of praise for Raúl Ruidiaz, despite the fact that his statistics with the national team seem more those of a central midfielder: 4 goals in 54 games. But the flat, who hasn’t been doing well lately with the Sounders either, is the broken man of a country torn apart. The Peru of Percy Rojas, Perico León and Lolo Fernández has no strikers! The best attacker in the championship is Santiago Giordana, a 25-year-old from Córdoba who, before arriving in Peru, wandered through his country’s second division until landing at the Ecuadorian Mushuc Runa. He adds 22 goals. Behind are his compatriots Carlos Garcés (Cienciano) and Adrián Fernández (Alianza Atlético) with 14, the Colombian Yorleys Mena with 13 and just after Alex Valera appears with 12 goals. What can Juan do in the face of such a shortage? Summon Percy Liza who squandered the chance of his life in Portugal? He has called Matías Succar, a 24-year-old boy who has barely scored 6 goals in the tournament, and Christopher Olivares, who has not played since the end of July due to a tear.

Will Paolo be number 9 in Ciudad del Este? He is not the same Guerrero from Inter, much less the one who wore the Flamengo or Corinthians shirt. He no longer reaches the ball easily, the defenders body him with less difficulty, but he adds minutes with the LDU and that, in times of drought, helps. The version that DT handles is that André Carrillo could be tested in the position, perhaps imagining a match where speed is favored in the game against and positional changes. Will have to see. There is no owner of the position. With Lapadula dragging a splint and Valera fighting with the anxiety of someone who has a closed bow, Paolo is a commitment to nostalgia. Almost almost like the selection. A matter of faith.

The dream of the fifth game

For Juan Reynoso, Peru cannot be satisfied just with qualifying for the World Cup, but with advancing in the competition. A few weeks ago, in a meeting with students from a well-known university, he said that he “visualizes himself” playing the fifth game of the World Cup. “The issue of the classification is going to happen, there are going to be ups and downs… but if we manage to have a balance and make the generational transition as natural as possible, that’s going to be the key to reaching that fifth game” he pointed out.