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Peru is another enigma in south american football. They are similar to Colombia. It does seem they come in and out when they want to play. I read about El Nene Cubillas played and from what I have read he was a fantastic player in his prime. This is a trend in south american football all but Argentina,Brasil. Teams come and go, Ecuador,Chilie,Paraguay,Colombia are never really consistant nations. Peru might be dead last in the WCQ but take my word that is one team you do not want to face in Lima. They are no joke, the fans are on top of you and it might be the spirit of the Incas that pulls them through. I recall them just beating up on Argentina, kicking whoever they wanted and they gave Messi no space at all. Will Peru ever get back to its days, well I think it has to start sending more players out to Argentina,Brasil and Europe for the the players to develop.

And I was reading about players joining other national teams. This bothers me a lot. Argentina has the same issue, Spain asked Messi to play for them when he was a youngster but he turned it down. They have asked young prodigy Mauro Icardi the same but he as well turned it down to play for Argentina. A few players have jumped ship to Spain or Italia, Gerardo Bruna the Liverpool talent declared he would play for Spain over Argentina even though he was born in Argentina. And Forestieri who was born in Argentina to Italian parents declared to play for ITALIA over Argentina. Also Higuain was asked to play for France but turned it down as well. I can understand why some of these players decide to jump ship because that they just will not be able to make the national squad.

dont you mean "dunga might call up Amauri for next week"?

With players like Farfán, Guerrero, Pizarro, Solano and Vargas I think Perú has some quality in their national team. The problem is that things are not well from top to bottom. There is no way to make it through the long and hard road of qualifications with the FA, the coach and the players all fighting and dividing instead of the opposite. Look at Paraguay for example: from top (the FA) to bottom (the fans) everyone is pushing to get the team to SA 2010. Maño Ruiz once said, when asked why Paraguay was on its way to Germany 2006, that when the head is good then everything else is too. He was referring to the Paraguayan FA.

Perú is in constant caos, clubwise too. Its football clubs are always a joke in the Copa Libertadores or Sudamericana. I remember a time when Universitario and Sporting Cristal were no easy opponents for the top South American clubs.

Perú's FA needs to re examine everything and set forth new plans for the future of Peruvian football.

tim what has happened to highly-rated brazilians kerlon and lulinha??

Fascinating article Tim, so much better than the often bland ´óÏó´«Ã½ football blogs.

Part of Peru's problems is the negativity you mention - but Cubillas is as guilty of it as anyone. In reality I'm not convinced Cubillas' generation were so much mentally and physically superior to the later players. He may have been personally, but anyone who saw their 6-0 capitulation to Argentina in 1978 knows that team lacked a lot - integrity for a start - whatever their technical gifts.

They were made to look better by the fact that outside Brazil, Urugay and Argentina many of their other South American rivals in the 70s and 80s were very poorly managed at all levels. I personally think the advent of the brilliant Colombian restructuring in the 80s, and their subsequent rise up the world rankings (with some coaches moving onto Ecuador by the 2000s & acheiving great things there too) shows that its a management issue and not a player issue. Ecuador don't have a significantly better team than Peru have had, but they've been at the last 2 world cups.

Its much easier for the criminally mismanaged FA to feed the media 'partying' players stories than to change the status quo. That's hard to change I appreciate. But ex-players with huge media clout putting down the current generation would be a far easier problem to solve. Otherwise its pretty easy to see why Pizarro, Guerrero and co just think to themselves 'this isn't worth it' - besides a sense of duty to your country, why should they have to take all the criticism? They've worked extremely hard to make lucrative careers for themselves, and proven their physical and mental strength already.

Good article again Tim. Although I suspect you may get fewer responses than last week....

From my (Scottish) perspective, it's interesting what you say regarding the Peru team of 1978. As someone who was bought 3 years after Argentina, that tournament is still etched into our footballing consciousness due to the 'embarassment' of the results, of which Peru is obviously mentioned.

We are often told that Peru were a mediocre nation that we should have comfortably beaten, but as you have alluded to, they were certainly no mugs at that time. I'm sure however, given the lofty expectations of Ally's Army at the time that it may be difficult to argue that we shouldn't have won the match!

Maybe the defeat wasn't as embarassing as we have made it out to be in Scotland?

* that should read 'born 3 years after Argentina'. As far as I'm aware my parents weren't involved in the buying and selling of children.....

oops...

* that should read 'born 3 years after Argentina'. As far as I'm aware my parents weren't involved in the buying and selling of children.....

oops

Hi Tim,

Interesting piece about a country I thoroughly enjoyed visiting late in 2006.

Having stayed in Cusco I'm now the proud owner of an official replica Cienciano shirt (less than a fiver English clubs please note) and visited the ground. Sadly, the day they played at home, I was on plane to the Amazon and missed the home game against Universitario. However, the team from Lima stayed at our hotel with the riot police in attendance to ensure that local fans did not disturb them pre-match! Whilst they were wondering around the hotel, you could not help but notice how diminutive they were. For the country's traditionally top team they simply did not look like they could hold their own against the physically superior Europeans or indeed other South American sides. Perhaps this is a factor in their recent slide down the rankings as other countries now place great emphasis on improved athleticism.

The other point I wanted to raise was that despite the article mentioning the poor state of clubs, Cienciano won the Recopa Sudamericana in 2004. What happened to the players in this triumphant team? Did none of them go on to win International caps?

I thought when you wrote Dunga was calling Dunga I was under the impression that theres another Dunga out there. Like Pele.

One player that deserves a mention is ex-newcastle and Villa midfielder Nolberto Solano. A model proffessional who some of the new generation of peruvian players could learn from.

Tim, I think the creators of Football Manager picked up on your reccommendation of Edison Cavani. His stats and performances for teams on FM were phenomenal (especially if like me you took notice of what your scouts said and bought him for the relative bargain of £15m - still rate that as my best bit of business on FM).

Back to the main article, as you say Peru have a number of good players but then you could say so do most South American teams, especially when it comes to technique.

You also cite the bad press Peruvian players receive, do you think the behaviour of the press in England could be a factor in England's lack of success?

tim, let's not forget about that generation of players lost in that tragic plane crash that killed all but one Alianza player. They were the champions and one of the best teams Peru has ever had.

I simply want to agree with comment 13. Nolberto Solano is a superb professional who is an outstanding role model for Peruvian youth.

I have lived in Peru for 18 years, and if you think the football is bad now, you should have seen it then. The national squad wouldn't have made the old fourth division.

But then I'm a Newcastle supporter and I can date the decline of my club from the day that Nobby left us.

Just a couple of comments. Solano rules, he was a superb player and he probably still is a good player (i haven´t seen him playing recently). I still remember his goal against us in WCQ2006....

Anyway, a bit out of topic, talking about FIFA bothered with the Peruvian government involved in the FPF, does FIFA really believe that in countries without a democratic government, the government does not interfere with the national FA?

#10 by Tim

Certainly from my perspective, I would agree with your Scottish friends that 1978 has been the defining moment of modern Scottish football.

I think we as a footballing nation learnt a very harsh lesson that summer and it has dented our confidence to the degree that rather than looking on the positives we look for the negatives in our game. Any optimism is quickly shot down with reminders of 78 and at every opportunity we remind ourselves that we are "only" Scotland and question if we deserve our place amongst the big boys.

I'm not sure how we can resolve that, or if it's ever likely to be resolved, but as I said in my earlier post, even as someone who wasn't even born at the time, the scars left by Peru and Iran in 1978 are still felt to this day in the Scottish game.

Great Article again Tim, a thouroughly enjoyable read on another nation not many people will know about.

to me it does seem daft that a nation that has produced quite a good few players of late, pizzaro, farfan, guerrero, mendoza, solano etc., dont actually do better in the South American championships and qualifiers, i dont believe that it helps when any team has the media on their backs, let alone when they are actually making up false stories to sell papers or get people to watch their programmes, its disgraceful.
I think that this has been a problem for the England national team for a while now, we have some of the most vicious and over-critical media around, they are an absolute disgrace how they have treated some of the players and managers.

but politics also never help football matters, its just a downward spiral to ruins for everyone involved, it will all end in tears, with a massive rebuilding job to do.

but i do think that like most say the South American football is swings and roundabouts for most of the nations down there, apart form the big two(Argentina and Brazil), as they have all had a relative bit of success in fits and spurts with decent teams at certain times, colombia, mexico, peru, uruguay all in the past and now its ecuador, paraguay in the present, which has all left us wondering what happend to them as they showed good promise.
I feel as when most of us see a South American team, apart for the big two, doing well that we all begin to think and believe that they might go on to be the next South American footballing superpower.

Tim.

Is there any chance I could have your job?

Or at least be your assistant.

Please.

Thanks.

Ally.

Tim,

Obviously the state of football in Peru is a complex issue, but all political and administrative problems aside, what do you make of the talent of the Peruvian players?

Although I have only a superficial knowledge of their players it seems to me that they do have talented individuals in the likes of Farfan and Pizarro and I see that a few players in their squad are playing in Europe.

Is the potential there for them to be a more prominent competitor in South America?

Tim,

Wonder if you could give me an insight.

Rafael is playing, in parts, for Manchester Uniteds first team & he looks a gem of a player.

I understand that he joined United along with his twin brother Fabio, who I believe to be a left-back. I have not seen anything of him as of yet.

Is he not as good as his brother, will he ever make the cut at United - it seems as though Rafael will.

Thanks in advance.

It is funny everyone mentioning Nolberto Solano...because I do remember a couple of years ago he was also accused of being an alcoholic and been caught drunk in control of a vehicle when visiting Peru...another fabrication of the Peruvian FA?
As others have rightly said, lots of things in Peru are in chaos, so it is no surprise that corruption is rife in their FA (even more so than ours). It's a shame, for a country I have visited twice in the last 7 years, and whose fans are just as pasionate about the game as any other country's, they deserve more!

#22 Sir Bobby Dangles

Check out Tim's article from 29 September about young South Americans going to Europe early.

/blogs/timvickery/2008/09/unknown_possebon_hits_headline.html

Thanks TomMansell82.

Appreciated.

tim,
you are probably right about the fact that Brazilians don´t worry too much about our youngsters moving to Europe.
Nevertheless, we must state there is a growing moviment towards not calling up Brazilians playing abroad to our national canary squad.
Brazilian economy is growing fast and steadily and most our domestic top players still make a lot of money working here. So the idea is that they would have to choose between this latter and the consequent elegibility to play for Brazil or being a millionaire in (c)old European club football.

hi tim.have a question.how good is suarez who plays fo ajax and uruguay.think the boy is good.how come no 'big' move yet.secondly.i am a brazil fan.my frend love albiceleste.now u have heard this one before.who was better and why.pele or maradona.
cheers mate

in reply to comment 22.

the reason you see rafael da silva playing more than his brother is because of the simply reason that evra is such a good left back and has not been injured or out of the team where as brown has been injured and gary neville is on the way out........ or he's just not as good!

An interesting take on life outside of South America's big two.

Make sure you read the link about the Peruvian broadcaster in prison. (

It sure loses something in translation!

post 22, Fabio is much better than Rafael. i think he's either injured or has found competition at left-back too strong (unlike Rafael's easier battle vs Weak Brown and Old Neville).

Every once in a while, a new Peruvian star is born and he's expected to be the next so and so, or surpass so and so's achievments. Right now, its young Raymond Manco. But that's the problem. It's all based on individuals, not the collective. The U17's relied on Manco, U20's on Ismodes, senior team on Solano, then Pizarro, recently Farfan and probably Vargas soon. The Peruvian FA is not building a team, it relies on individual talent, like Cubillas once was, to lift the entire team. Gone are the days of this strategy, even Maradona can't do that today. Football is more on the collective. You can have a successful team of average players rather than one built around a single star

Tim, i'd kill for your job...but i got a question for now. Chile seems to be producing a new attacking midfielder on a daily basis! Valdivia, Villanueva, Mati Fernandez, Fabi Orellana, Sanchez, Beausejours, Vidangossy, Pedro Moralez...what do you think is the reason behind this? and can there be a system o fit so much talented individuals? we've seen Chile trounce Argentina in a 3-4-3 formation...is that the way forward? thanks