Opinion
Colombia's José Pékerman returns to the JC with his World Cup diary
The Jewish manager writes about his World Cup so far*
June 20, 2018 09:40
2 min read
The Jewish manager writes about his World Cup so far*
June 20, 2018 09:40Hola once more to all my friends in Inglaterra. Four years later and Colombia are qualificado for the Mondial again.
I was not planning to repeat my column from 2014 about life in the Colombian camp. I am busy deciding on formations and team selections and as you know I no speak Ingles too good.
But a few weeks ago I answered my door to find el hombre grande from the JC standing there. He had the look of a desperado – he say the paper needs to write about the tournament and I am the only Jewish chico involved.
He brought a jar of gefilte fish – hard to find in Bogota – so I say yes to him and now you have the exclusivo from Pekerman in the World Cup.
I do not like to speak to the media too much but think the Japan and Senegal coach will not receive a regular copy of the JC so I can tell you about my plans to play 4-3-2-1 with Quintero in the hole behind Radamel - and no-one will ever know.
So I am back in the shtetl many years after my grandparents left (ok so they came from Ukraine but let us not, how you say, split the hairs).
I’m not sure my grandparents would recognise this place – I don’t think there were too many 50,000 all-seater stadiums back then – but the borscht tastes like my abuela used to make and everyone is mui friendly.
We had one week here before the big kick off so the players had mucho tempo to get used to the new surroundings. Para me it is similar to preparing for the barmitzvah.
Like the barmitzvah you have months to rehearse quietly and then a terrifying moment in front of a big audience to find out whether you succeed or fail. Unlike the barmitzvah there is no herring or bagels and if you lose there is a chance of assassination back home.
Despite an injury to the calf of James Rodriguez I was confident that we could defeat Japan in our primero partido. That is until my loco defender Carlos Sanches received the tarjeta roja after only three minutos.
It was a beautiful save by Carlos, but unfortunado, Carlos is not the goalkeeper. Then Japan scored from the penalty – oy vey.
Quintero scored a beautiful goal from a free kick to equalise but then the Japanese were too strong in the second half with their extra player and they dominated possession and ulitmado score the second gol.
Is a un poco ironico that my ancestors ran away from the pogroms to arrive in Buenos Aires in search of a new life. If things continue this way I may be staying right here to avoid my own personal progrom back in South America.
Still we must be fuerte. There are still two games to go and we have great players like James and Falcao, plus, how you say, half-decent Gooner reserve goalkeeper Ospina. Things can only get better when we play the Poles on Sunday.
Until then, hasta luego mis amigos.
*As imagined by a JC reporter