How the Vinotinto rebirth came about: lessons for Peru from Fossati and how far away Peruvian football is

What does the Peruvian national team have to learn from this scene? Possibly nothing. We already experienced the height of the epic a few years ago in the 2019 Copa América, when, led by Ricardo Gareca, the Blanquirroja eliminated Uruguay on penalties and impeccably beat the Chilean national team in what must be the most beautiful demonstration of good football in the Tigre era.

• Venezuela in the 2024 Copa America

There is just one detail. When we delve deeper into this resurgence of the Vinotinto, which in addition to reaching the quarter-finals of the Copa América with a perfect score, currently occupies fourth place in the Qualifiers, we find a very solid project that we will describe in the most didactic way possible. It is then when we realize that unlike our most recent golden era that dates from between 2015 and 2022, in Venezuela the improvement of its football is based on long-term work and is not the result, as in our case, of a miracle called Gareca.

Serious and long-term

Rafael Romo saved a penalty against Mexico in the 87th minute and with that Venezuela ended up winning 1-0, in what must be one of the most important victories in the recent history of the Vinotinto in Copa America. After the surprising victory in the debut against Ecuador (2-1), beating the ‘Tri’ ended up shaping this llanero revolution in South American football. With the 3-0 over Jamaica in the last date of Group B, the football proposal of coach Fernando Batista was set on fire.

“There is no doubt that what we are seeing is not accidental. If we evaluate the Copa America, performance patterns from the previous qualifiers are being repeated and, in particular, it seems to me that Venezuela’s current form has several factors that definitely influence this leap in quality,” he explains. Jairo Cardenas, presenter on the show Football time.

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Cárdenas points out three fundamental factors. The first factor has to do with the footballers, many of whom were trained in the Venezuelan League between 2008 and 2012 and then left to go abroad. “The first factor is that it comes from long ago and it is the subject of footballers, the footballers who are today in the high competitive performance of Venezuela are those who came out of the local tournament a few years ago and who have managed to be in their team in a competitive way, such as Yangel Herrera in Spanish football, to cite an example, right now Rafa Romo in Ecuadorian football, Jon Aramburu, who is a new player that is appearing in the national team, who is in Real Sociedad of Spain, then we also have to analyze those who have been performing like José Martínez who is in the MLS, and then also take it to perhaps one of the pillars like Salomón Rondón, who is living his best moment in Mexican football.”adds the football narrator.

“The local league has a lot to do with it, but not the current one. Today the national team is reaping the results of a sowing that has been going on since 2012 onwards.”adds Luis Vilchez, journalist and sports commentator in The FUTVE League on the Valencia and Puerto Cabello axis.

The stories make noise as soon as a first comparison is made with the reality of Peruvian football, taking into account that since 2021, the number of Peruvian footballers arriving abroad is increasingly smaller. According to a report made by journalist Franz Tamayo for depor.comonly 17 Peruvian footballers managed to emigrate between 2020 and 2023. The big problem is that at least 14 of them are already back in Liga 1. This is the generation that has to take the reins of the Peruvian national team.

The power of exporting

Journalist Pablo Alejandro Rondon from the FUTVE League adds a very valuable detail to understand a project that was strengthened by the change in the model of the Venezuelan First Division clubs. The sports institutions, for various reasons, changed their approach from a traditional one, in which the attraction was to sign foreign players, to a model in which the priority was the training of footballers for export.

“Our league, unlike many in South America, has taken on a very positive concept, which is the concept of being an export league, which showcases figures from a very young age. An example is Kervin Andrade, who debuted at 16 and just days after turning 16, he played for two full seasons and ended up being exported to Brazil. Recently, striker David Martínez was exported to the MLS, one of the current jewels of Venezuelan football and who is not in this Copa América due to a physical issue, but is called to be one of the next pieces in the national team.” Rondón explains.

Vílchez agrees with the change in the business model and emphasizes: “The clubs understood that it is not worth spending a lot of money on a foreigner, but rather it is better to invest that money in a young player. Show off that talent so that later on you will get a return in cash.”

However, the political and economic situation in a crisis-ravaged Venezuela ended up being a trigger for the restructuring of the local league. “We suffered hyperinflation, the biggest in South America in the 21st century, it must be the longest hyperinflation in the top 5 in the world, that leaves a very hard scar, but I am talking about the context of clubs whose leitmotiv is to be sustainable over time, so as a result of this crisis, clubs were disappearing, such as Mineros de Guayana, a team with a lot of tradition, champion; also Deportivo Lara, which is in limbo due to debts; there is Deportivo Anzoátegui, Deportivo Alicia, Deportivo Italia, which have been disappearing because they did not know how to change their model. Today the league clubs understand that the model is to train talent to export as young as possible, for this reason the clubs are left without high-level results in South America, but the player leaves very soon and can develop abroad.”argues Vilchez.

Peruvian football is far from changing its business model. In a recent analysis in the newspaper El Comercio, we noted that all the centre forwards of the top ten clubs in the Apertura Tournament in Peruvian football were foreigners and, for the most part, footballers over 30 years old. This leaves no room for the possibility of creating new options and ending the dependence on veteran footballers like 40-year-old Paolo Guerrero in the Peruvian national team.

• Venezuelan footballers in the MLS 2023-2024

The mental factor

As in the peak of the Peruvian national team’s performance in the Gareca era, the mental factor is being decisive in this Vinotinto of ‘Checho’ Batista. The Argentine’s power of persuasion and his ability to support and generate confidence in the selected players has a lot to do with the results on the field in this Copa América.

“This feat is not accidental. The change of mind of the footballers under the leadership of Fernando Batista has been fundamental. The success of the national team came from Venezuelan football, but many of them came from very young, the local tournament is light years away because the whole group of players currently lives abroad, only one is from the local league, but with a lot of experience in Europe.”the journalist estimates Miguel Angel Cardenas from the program Beyond Football.

One more detail. Batista is noted for having achieved leadership within the Vinotinto, a detail that has not yet been reflected in Jorge Fossati’s Peruvian team and could not be highlighted in Juan Reynoso’s short experience in charge of the Bicolor. “Getting back into the locker room has been crucial to Batista’s progressive success, the leadership in the locker room, which is the most important thing for a team, having group harmony, something that was not there in previous years, and that is why there were so many problems outside of the sporting aspect that ended up influencing performance on the field,” The journalist warns Yovanny Vasquez.

“This confidence of the coaching staff in the players is important, they are supported, for the first time they have brought three forwards and all three scored in the first round, it is important to highlight this in a youth base with some experience that is working with mental work, which was another of the shortcomings and that always decided games, we lacked that of being very strong in the head and focused on the game”Vasquez says.

Search and replacement

In 2020, Venezuela ranked sixth among the countries that exported the most footballers from CONMEBOL, with 113 players and a percentage of 75.2%, according to a study by the CIES Football Observatory. The main destination was Colombian football. Peru, between 2020 and 2023, only exported 17 players. Currently, there are more than 30 Venezuelan footballers playing in the Old Continent.

“Our national team is very much related to the fact that all the players or the core of the team are clearly active in the international arena, both in Europe and South America, important leagues where most of those who have played or have been starters have established themselves, are starters in their clubs and therefore show that result and that is what football is about, about the present. And Batista has also understood this in this way, to use the present and get the most out of this type of player.”says Yovanny Vásquez.

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“When you look at the national football team, you see that they are the foundation of those who finished last in the last two qualifiers, but they are also the foundation of those who managed to finish fourth in the 2016 Copa América and reached the quarter-finals in 2019, where they were eliminated by Argentina. They are even part of that team that beat Colombia in 2015. There you realize that this is the result of a process in which there is a foundation, but there is also the emergence of young figures and that the experienced ones are progressively leaving their place.”says Jairo Cardenas.

This Friday’s game against Argentina is just a football match, but it could also be the prologue to a success story. Venezuelan football has been rebuilt in the midst of a political and social crisis that is ravaging it, and that has it on edge just weeks before its presidential elections. However, what coach Batista has achieved is very commendable: he has consolidated a long and patient bet to make football overshadow baseball these days.

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