With Luis Suarez on the bench, Uruguay’s Copa never got off the ground. Jon Levy on why.
Jon Levy
I started seriously following Uruguay just prior to the 2010 World Cup.
La Celeste had just taken down Costa Rica in a playoff to make the World Cup in South Africa, ensuring that Jon Bornstein would be reviled in Costa Rica forever for scoring the goal that doomed the Ticos to a brutal playoff. But it wasn’t out of any ill will for our CONCACAF brethren that I started following Uruguay. It was out of love for Diego Forlan. The ultra talented forward’s considerable skill set was always a joy to behold when he put it all together, and he was able to do just that for a month straight in South Africa. Spoiler alert: Forlan won the Golden Ball as the World Cup’s best player, and unlike 2014 when Messi got his Career Achievement Award Gold Ball, this one was a no doubter. But it was much more than Diego Forlan that kept me on board the Uruguay train in 2010 and beyond.
The team itself found magic when manager Oscar Tabarez switched his formation after the first match of tournament, inserting a very young Edinson Cavani into the lineup, and opting for a sort of unbalanced 4-3-3 with Forlan in a hybrid left wing forward/left midfielder role. Veteran midfielders Egidio Alvaro Rios, Diego “Ruso” Perez, and Walter Gargano were monstrous to attackers, and the flying fullbacks Pereira (Maxi and Alvaro) helped sparked attacks for for a team that could keep the ball, but didn’t need a ton of possession to hurt you. Captain Diego Lugano was a rock at the back as he helped groom current Uruguay captain Diego Godin into one of the best center backs in the world. This group made the 2010 World Cup semifinal and would go on to win Copa América the next summer. It was the perfect mix of young and old, steel and skill. And while I knew while watching La Celeste during those wonderful tournaments that future versions of the team could never hold as special a place in my heart (hey, it’s not like I’m Uruguayan or anything), I never would have guessed the reason for the failures to come. Uruguay still has a good mix with regard to the factors I’ve just listed, and they’ve still got the ageless Oscar Tabarez managing on the sidelines, but this team has possibly the most apparent leadership vacuum I’ve ever seen.
Lugano and Forlan were the unquestioned leaders of the team that made that wonderful run in 2010, but they weren’t alone. Lugano was already turning Godin into a trusted deputy, and midfielders Perez, Gargano, and especially Rios were clear, capable lieutenants. So why is the current incarnation of this national team such a volatile mess? How can they look like world beaters in World Cup Qualifying but keep on crumbling on the big stages of international tournaments?
I don’t have the answer, but I’ve got ideas. Younger players like Cavani and Suarez, who were key components of the 2010 team, had mpressed their veteran teammates with their skill, and simply fallen into line when the situation called for them to play the good soldier. But as they’ve become better players, they’ve also become emboldened by their success. All of this happening as the old guard started to fall out of frame. None of this analysis is groundbreaking, but I find it very interesting that Tabarez can’t find field generals aside from Godin who can tell the team’s capricious stars to shut up, keep it together, and focus. And I’m just as baffled by Edinson Cavani’s consistent failure to seize the moment. He’s had a number of real chances to step out of Forlan’s shadow/Suarez’s shadow/Ibra’s shadow (at club level), and he seems to play the shrinking violet every time he has the big stage to himself. But at this point it’s either a failure of coaching (which hurts me to say), or a leadership vacuum extending to the whole player pool. We’ve seen the Luis and Edinson show go wrong so many times, starting in the 2012 Olympics and carrying on through the most recent World Cup and last summer’s Copa. You know those guys aren’t going to lead. To echo the Alexi Lalas take on the Kei Kamara/Federico Higuain bust up: You don’t have to like goal scorers, you just need them to score goals. And it astonishes that a country that takes such pride in its performance, at any competition, could suffer for leaders.
Okay; I’ve said all I need to say. But I will leave you with one last thought, just so you I know I’m not one of these bandwagon Luis Suarez haters. I love watching the guy play. And for all those people hurling dictionary derogatories at him like “abhorrent,” remember this: The respectable team that I lauded so heavily at the beginning of this post doesn’t make that World Cup semifinal without Suarez pulling a blatant Mutombo hand rejection out of his back pocket on the goal line right before penalties. The guy wants to win, and yeah, sometimes he bites people in the process too. And most of the high-horse crowd would buy his shirt in a second if he was on their favorite team. When I hear most people talk about being “disgusted by his antics,” my mind quickly goes to a scene from Inglorious Basterds. British Lt. Archie Hicox has concerns about Basterd Sgt. Hugo Stiglitz (hit the guitar riff, and Samuel L.’s iconic intro), with whom he’ll be going undercover. He voices his concern to Lt. Aldo Raine, saying, “Stiglitz, not exactly the loquacious type is he?” And Raine’s/Pitt’s response is my response to most Luis Suarez critics. “That the kinda man you need? Loquacious type?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wi56qcTDtfE
Jon Levy co-founded The Yanks Are Coming. Follow him on Twitter @TYAC_Jon.