Carlos Bilardo, the controversial Argentine coach who inspires new HBO Max documentary

It was enough to know that HBO Max is preparing a documentary series about former technical director Carlos Salvador Bilardo to unleash speculation about what topics an audiovisual product could deal with, obviously focused on fans of this popular sport.

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How to summarize in just four episodes everything that name implies? Next, we will review some aspects that made the ‘Doctor’ an icon of Argentine football that, although today is not passing his best moment – he is bearing the consequences of Hakim Adams syndrome at the age of 83 – has not been forgotten at all by the ‘World football’.

SUCCESSFUL AS A FOOTBALL PLAYER

Perhaps the most recent generations link Carlos Bilardo with sports broadcasts and analysis programs, however, it must be said that the character in question commented with an experience that few of his companions have. Not only because of his past as a DT, but also because he was a footballer, a facet in which he achieved successes that perhaps many ignore.

The ‘Doctor’ had a short season playing for San Lorenzo de Almagro, a popular soccer club based in Buenos Aires. There he would play between 1958 and 1961, achieving a domestic title, before being transferred to Deportivo Español (today in a lower category).

In 1965, Bilardo would be signed by a team that marked him almost to the end of his career on the pitch: Estudiantes de la Plata. The ‘Pincha’ welcomed him for an unforgettable five years, in which raising glasses became a custom, and which allowed said institution to make a name for itself worldwide.

A metropolitan championship in 1967, three Libertadores Cups (1968,1969,1970), an Intercontinental in 1968 and an Inter-American in the following year are part of the record of Bilardo, a soccer player with Estudiantes. We are facing a player who knew how to share a dressing room with greats such as ‘Cacho’ Malbernat, Felipe Ribaudo, Ramón Aguirre Suárez, Hugo Medina, among others.

LEGENDARY AS A COACH

Although as a footballer he wore few shirts, in his role as a coach a somewhat different situation would happen. The ‘Doctor’ dressed the diver not only in his native country (Estudiantes de la Plata, San Lorenzo and Boca Juniors), but he also managed to direct clubs as well as abroad such as Deportivo Cali in Colombia, Sevilla in Spain, and two senior teams (Colombia and Libya).

Only one title would achieve directing clubs, the 1982 National Championship with Estudiantes de la Plata, but the main course would come with his selection. After his good campaign with the ‘Pincha’ of his loves, Carlos Bilardo was presented as technical director of the ‘celeste y blanco’ to lead an indelible cycle in the memory of millions of Argentines.

In his first World Cup experience, Bilardo managed to form a team that went from less to more. Without much anticipation, but from the hand of the best in the world, Diego Armando Maradona, the Argentine team would manage to raise the cup for the second time in its history. Paradoxically, the first time she was crowned champion, she would do it hand in hand with the one who, for the connoisseurs, is the opposite extreme of the ‘doctor’: César Luis Menotti (maximum Argentine reference in the search for good football / fair play / attack).

The superb performances of Maradona, with ‘Mano de Dios’ and with ‘The most beautiful goal of the World Cups’ included, outstanding appearances by Burruchaga, Valdano, Giusti, Olarticochea, Pumpido, Ruggeri and company, would be the precise mix to defeat national teams on the level of Uruguay, England, Belgium and Germany (in the final).

Something that until today has been impossible, repeating the world title with the same coach, was about to be achieved in Argentina. Four years after that celebration at the Azteca stadium, the ‘blue and white’ would reach the final of the World Cup in Italy, falling by a goal five minutes after regulation time ends. Thus, the ‘Doctor’ almost achieved what no one could.

SYMBOL OF THE ‘FOLKLORE’ SURROUNDING THE FOOTBALL

Most likely, the series about Bilardo will not be only figures and statistics. Even less in the case of a man who has lived football like few others. Inspired by the legacy of Osvaldo Zubeldía, Carlos Salvador approached this sport under a single slogan: the result above all else.

“There are no more result-oriented people in the world than me,” the World Champion coach once said. Phrases like this, marked by honesty in a world concerned with keeping up appearances, were common currency for this doctor by profession who gave his life to football.

To the logic of victory is the first and also the second, aspects such as his predilection for cabal (crossing the exit of the rivals before starting the game), or his ability to star in events at the limit of the regulation must be added (the jerrycan with dirty water that the Argentine props allegedly gave the Brazilian Branco in a World Cup, or the alleged use of pins to intimidate the rival before a corner kick). Stories like that abound.

But perhaps none so insurmountable as the one he starred in on the River Plate court back in 2004, in his last season as coach of his beloved Estudiantes de la Plata. Seconds before the game, the ‘Doctor’ is intervened by the authorities. What happened? He opened a bottle of Champagne on the edge of the substitute bench, poured the contents into a glass and drank it smiling in front of the television cameras.

“The entry of alcoholic beverages into a stadium is prohibited,” a security agent told him. “I have fifty years of court, no miss, there is no alcoholic drink. He has Gatorei! ”, The controversial coach responded that sunny afternoon.

With Bilardo, anything could be missing, but never the show.