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Gonzalo Orellana
London, United Kingdom
The name of this article is deliberately provocative, when one speaks about Latin American football, one immediately thinks of Messi, Neymar, Suarez or Alexis Sánchez and one has the impression that all is well. However, these great players hide the various problems that hinder football in Latin America. This article goes beyond the international role of the recent unfinished Copa Libertadores final or the poor result of the Latin American World Cup teams in Russia.
Was this poor performance somewhat isolated or did it have more serious problems? Including that of Russia, 21 World Cups were contested, 9 in Latin America and 12 in Europe. Our region had 43% of the champions, 33% of the finalists and 26% of the semi-finalists since 1930, the year of the first World Cup, a rather impressive number.
However, when we divide the worlds into 2 groups: the top 10 (up to 1974) and the last 11 (up to 2018), we see a decline in performance in Latin America: in the first half, the region had 50% of the champions, 35% of the finalists and 28% of the semi-finalists, these figures fell to 40%, 35% and 25% in the second half. The picture is even worse when we do not focus on the last 20 years. Since 1998, the region has won only 17% of the championships, 25% of the finalists and 21% of the semi-finalists. In addition, Russia was the fourth consecutive World Cup for Europeans, something that never happened. From 1966 to 2002, we have always had a European champion followed by a champion from South America. Since then, the European hegemony has not stopped growing.
The World Cup is the biggest football tournament in the world, but that's not all. If we want to conclude that football is in decline in the region, we must look beyond. Let's start with football leagues; there is no doubt that the Spanish, English, Italian or German leagues are considerably superior to the Latin American leagues. However, in the last 10 or 15 years, the differences have widened. This is largely due to the budget difference. During the past season, each Premier League team received a minimum of 100 million pounds ($ 130 million) for television rights. That is, the recently promoted cities of Wolverhampton or Stoke City have a million-dollar budget that gives the impression that Latin Americans are like a neighborhood league team.
Now let's take a look at what's happening at the club level. During the 1960s, '70s and' 80s, it was common for South American teams to win the World Cup or Intercontinental Cup. On the other hand, in the last 10 editions, the Europeans won 9 times. This is despite the fact that the level of importance badigned to it in Europe is inversely proportional to that attributed in South America to this tournament. The institutional aspects have been useful. For several years, UEFA has established financial fair play rules to prevent financial mismanagement from destabilizing European teams, a problem that is very common in Latin American clubs.
But having a strong league and competitive teams is just one way to build a competitive national team. Many countries that do not have a strong league compensate by sending their players to play in big teams and profit from them. Latin America has historically followed this path, the region has always been a net exporter of talent, even if it does so at a decreasing rate. In the Premier League, perhaps the best football league in the world, during the 2017-2018 season, there were 14 Brazilian players, which does not seem trivial before learning that there was 17 players from Belgium out of 11 million inhabitants, whose best result in the World Cup was reaching the semi-finals in 1986 and 2018, had more players than the five-time world champion? What is happening with the rest of Latin America? the result is even sadder. The sum of
Players from Mexico, Chile, Peru and Ecuador in the Premier League are equal to the number of players from Serbia (5).
Some will say that not speaking English is a limit for Latin American players in England, which is true. However, if we look at what happens in leagues like the Spanish one, we also see disturbing aspects. Real Madrid and FC Barcelona have always hosted many of the best Latin American players, from Di Steffano to Ronaldo, from Maradona to Messi. No season was marked by each of these teams. Argentinean and Brazilian team members. If we look at the season that has ended, we see that there was only one Argentinian and three Brazilians between the two Spanish teams, the same number of Croats. These examples help to understand the success of countries like Belgium or Croatia and the disappointment of former Latin American teams.
If leagues, teams and less and less Latin American players are not the elite of football, it is inevitable that the selections also show deterioration.
Why our football is in decline? There are many reasons for this: the corruption of the Latin American football federations has been monumental; the lack of long-term projects: while Germany had two technicians from 2006 to now, Argentina had 8. Europe is also investing more in its training divisions and it is better to Identify the potential players, let's look at the case of Iceland, a country According to the magazine The Economist, 100 professional football players were 23 in number and the small group was able to gather 23 players competitive enough to face the Argentina tied. Latin America continues to depend on its natural resources, these young people who play football on the streets or in a paddock, and who see sport as a way out of poverty. Sometimes improvisation and natural talent generate success, but in the long run, preparation and hard work are more effective at getting good results. Latin American football suffers from the same problems as Latin America.
Latin America needs football, it's one of the few areas where we are really good; Football unites Latin American societies more than anything else, even if it also encourages absurd violence: football allows low-income youth to become millionaires and national icons; National football teams tend to better represent the racial and social reality of our countries than the political, commercial or academic elites. But football also needs Latin America, otherwise the World Cup would become a Cup of Europe. Football needs the pbadion that drives the Latin American fans in the Russian stages more than the Europeans, despite the huge distance and difference. of income. But above all, football needs the creativity that players in our region have always brought.
Do not let the big players of the region prevent us from seeing the decline of Latin American football, Argentina and Brazil without Messi and Neymar are squad teams, the goleadas of Germany and the Holland in Brazil four years ago or Croatia in Argentina this world proves it. However, in the region, there are signs that the decline is not inevitable: Uruguay, which, thanks to Tabarez (responsible since 2006), has carried out an uninterrupted process that results in a strong team that uses rather its stars depend on them. His football federation has been less affected by the corruption of his South American colleagues and has a long-term plan: his youth teams played in the U-17 World Cup finals in 2011 and also the under-17s. 20 years in 2013 and he was semi-finalist in 2017..
Just as the problems of Latin American football are the same as those of their societies, their solutions are also similar. Better institutions, transparency in decision-making and resource management, well-managed football teams, long-term planning, investments in the training of children and young people, including the tools needed to live and adapt to from other countries, and sanitation of the swollen mafias who live on them. The results in football, as in other sports, depend more and more on processes, infrastructure, technologies and quality institutions. If Latin America does not adapt to it, it may end up like African football, a place where everyone knows there is talent but its limitations prevent it from being used. If that happens, it will be sad for both Latin America and football.
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