Eight casualties, with the third center-back and in front of a full stadium: the moment of the selection in the week of debut

But the days begin with new casualties. Yesterday the Bicolor announced two new dismissals. Pedro Aquino, who ended up injured in the duel between Santos and Pumas, was removed from the list, as was Anderson Santamaría. In replacement of the latter, Carlos Ascues was called urgently.

Yesterday in La Videna the group of locals trained, with Guerrero, Tapia and ‘Canchita’ Gonzales, the first foreign players to arrive. Thus, these are some questions that paint the panorama of the selection.

The casualties are many

Undoubtedly, the injured are a sensitive issue in a team that has just begun to be formed with Juan Reynoso. To the losses of Cueva, Flores and Bryan Reyna, now that of Aquino and Santamaría is added. That of the defender is the one that hurts the most, since Carlos Zambrano was already lost in that position.

In total, with the absence of Lapadula, there are eight players who were in the last call for the friendlies against Korea and Japan who will now not be at Videna: ‘9’, Zambrano, Santamaría, Lora, Aquino, Cueva, Reyna and Flowers.

Today the group should be completed with the arrival of players like Advíncula, López, Callens, in addition to those who play in the MLS.

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The itinerary in Ciudad del Este

It will be ‘a short week’ for the national team, since the entire group will only be there tomorrow, so the training will be strictly private. In the afternoon they travel to Ciudad del Este on a direct flight obtained with the new sponsor of the Bicolor, Sky, and there they will concentrate, not in Iguazú as they had thought before.

The team will have a day of training in the Paraguayan city, on Wednesday they will recognize Antonio Aranda’s field. Before that, Juan Reynoso must offer the press conference required by Conmebol, and then leave everything ready for the match on Thursday.

After the game, scheduled for Thursday at 5:30 pm, Peruvian time, the Bicolor returns to homeland to start planning what will be the match against Brazil on Tuesday.

captain warrior

Despite being a new process, for this start of the Qualifiers, the Peruvian team relies on what Paolo Guerrero can do. The 39-year-old attacker recently returned to the Bicolor in the last call for the Asian tour, when he was still in Racing, and now that he is a member of the LDU of Ecuador, he has once again been the protagonist and is expected to maintain that level with the red and white

Thus, Paolo is the only player who has remained in the team since the 2006 Qualifiers. Meanwhile, along with Aldo Corzo, they are the only two players who have been since the 2010 Qualifiers -Zambrano could also join in the next double date-.

Paolo comes with activity and motivation from LDU. Last Thursday they qualified for the semifinals of the Copa Sudamericana by beating Sao Paulo on penalties in Brazil. The national attacker was in charge of opening the batch for the Ecuadorians and did not miss his shot.

the rivals

Paraguay arrives with a list of figures for the match, with the curiosity that six summoned are active in local football, while it has Miguel Almirón (Newcastle), Gustavo Gómez (Palmeiras), Omar Alderete (Valencia), among others. Of course, they suffer the loss of Julio Enciso, a player for Brighton in the Premier League, who had a knee injury.

What is good for the Paraguayans is that they will play in a full stadium. The red-and-white cast announced that the tickets on sale for the Antonio Aranda stadium in Ciudad del Este were sold out. There will be more than 25,000 Guarani cheering on Guillermo Barros Schelotto’s team at this start of the Qualifiers.

Meanwhile, Brazil will not be able to count on Vinícius, but Neymar will be there in the duel against Peru next Tuesday at the National Stadium. Ney hasn’t played a football game since August 3, when he wore the PSG shirt against Jeonbuk Motor, in a Parisian friendly for Asia. It was the only game where he was active. After that, he signed for Al Hilal of Saudi Arabia, but has not been able to play yet due to injury.

This is how the Bicolor arrives for this start of the Qualifiers. The moment of truth has arrived and despite the casualties, he will go to Ciudad del Este to debut on the right foot.

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