(by Wolfy Becker)

(JP-wb) — There are only three months left until the Copa America kicks off in Venezuela, and Peru’s national football/soccer squad is still a headless chicken. Only seven months are left before the qualification rounds for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa begin, and the “red stripes” are still without a head coach.

It was less than a week ago when sirens wailed, church bells rang and a sea of confetti fluttered through Lima‘s historical central plaza at the stroke of noon Thursday, alerting Peruvians to synchronize their watches at the start of a nationwide campaign to promote punctuality.

It‘s a “horrible, dreadful, harmful custom,” Garcia said as the nationally televised ceremony kicked off the campaign, “La Hora sin Demora,” or “Time without Delay.” But Peru’s Football Federation (FPF) must have been deaf. They didn’t get the message. They keep doing things the conservative way: always at the 25th (or 26th) hour.

Peru was once a great, proud and sometimes even a successful football nation. The potential and premises for becoming a football powerhouse are certainly there. After all Peru is the third largest country in South America after Brazil and Argentina, two of the world’s leading, if not the leading football nations who are always considered as a favorite at World Cup tournaments. Ok, that’s a little unfair because Brazil’s area and population (188 million) is almost seven times as high as Peru’s (28 million). But Argentina has only 11 million more. At any rate, it is well-known that a country’s population isn’t necessarily relevant for being successful (see the USA, China, Russia or the Netherlands and Denmark for that matter).

Some people say that in South America football “is a religion”, the second largest after roman catholicism. It seems that everyone who goes to church on Sunday, whether they are 8 or 80 years old, is later headed for a TV or radio, if they have one.

This isn’t any different in Peru where every second youngster is wearing a football jersey and carries a ball around instead of a book. Many kids in poverty stricken South America only have one or two pieces of clothing they can wear which is an indication of significance. If you drive through the poorer rural areas, you will notice that the tiniest village has at least a small church and two or even four goal posts. Nevertheless, Peruvian football is on the decline for two decades now while other South American countries - for example Chile, Colombia, Paraguay and even tiny Ecuador - are steadily on the rise and compete for the third spot on the continent.

The last time Peru qualified for the big show, the World Cup, was in 1982 hosted by Spain. But the “golden generation” of the 1970s was clearly over the hill and they didn’t make it through the first round. The team featured Teofilo Cubillas, considered the greatest Peruvian footballer ever, and Julio Uribe and Juan Oblitas - now both strong candidates for the vacant national head coaching position.

Club football in South America continues to suffer from the continent’s economic deficiencies. The best players are lured across the Atlantic - every year there are about 1,000 players from Brazil alone headed to Europe where the money and the leading football infrastructure is. And crowds are low, with money tight and the fear of violence proving a powerful incentive to stay at home.

The average attendance in last year’s Brazilian championship was at a record low 20%, less than 10,000 per game. The situation in Argentina may be a little better. Boca Juniors and River Plate attract a steady crowd of about 40-50 thousand per game and Rosario Central’s 42,000 seat stadium is usually more than half full on average.

The last time a Peruvian club had any success was in 2003 when Cienciano of Cusco won the Copa Sudamericana (the equivalent of Europe’s UEFA Cup) by beating River Plate, and then put the icing on the cake by beating Boca Juniors too in the SuperCup played in Miami. At the time Peru had is lowest FIFA ranking ever at number 86 worldwide, dropping all the way down from 34th in 1997. Today Peru is ranked as the 67th best football nation. If the teams in the 70’s were called the “golden generation”, today’s team should be called the “fool’s gold generation”.

In Peru stadium attendance is as poor as it gets despite a steadily growing economy. I guess this is just another example for the fact that the economic boom hasn’t reached the masses, the average José. Although official unemployment numbers are somewhere below 8% and despite a strong macroeconomic performance, underemployment and poverty have stayed persistently high (both around 50%, more or less). I couldn’t find any official attendance numbers (I wonder why) and the leading newspapers and TV broadcasts never mention any official number for a game, probably because it would scare off potential new sponsors.

But you know the truth when you watch a game on TV. For most of the games I watched - and they were quite a few - the stands are mostly empty, for whatever reason. It seems that only the media, the clubs functionaries, a couple of sponsors, the two teams and the referee crew, and a few hundred fans - some of them hooligans - made their way to the game.

I grew up in Germany and watching a Peruvian 1st division football game in 2007 reminds me of a time when there were only two national and one regional German television channels and the regional channel was broadcasting a game from the German 3rd division. Except for all the advertisements -mostly beer brands -, changing clothing styles and hairdos. But attendance looks the same and the playing grounds look similar, sometimes they can only be compared to a recently harvested potato field.

One would think that the Copa America held in Peru in 2004 should have given the country a big boost. The home team finished second in group play with a win over Venezuela and two ties against Bolivia and Colombia but then lost in the quarterfinals to Argentina.

If it weren’t for some overdue stadium renovations - and a completely new 80.000 seat stadium called “El Monumental” which wasn’t even used for the tourney as far as I know - there wouldn’t be any obvious reminders. To the contrary, things went even more downhill from there. Although the player material isn’t that bad, at least on paper: Claudio Pizarro, Jefferson Farfan, Nolberto Solano, Juan Manuel Vargas, Paolo Guerrero are all playing currently in Europe and with the exception of Pizarro (28) and Solano (32), who is entering the twilight of his career, they are still relatively young.

However, Pizarro has the reputation of a “diva” in Peru, especially after he quit the team last year over a controversy that erupted when he preferred to return early to his German club Bayern Munich instead of playing the second game of a back-to-back friendly between Peru and Chile. Solano has also retired from the team mainly because he didn’t see any positive perspective. And Guerrero, now with his second German club Hamburger SV, sits on the bench most of the time (>> see previous article >>) and is overrated in my opinion. He still has to prove that he can be a consistent goal scoring threat over 90 minutes.

But at least they can count on some experience on how things work in Europe, how a football club is managed, and that it requires more than skill and talent to win a game. It takes a ton of discipline and tactical, organizational and strategical know-how. And this is what seems to be missing in Peru’s football league. In my sore eyes the overall quality of play looks very poor. Perhaps that can be blamed on the fact that on numerous occasions head coaches change every 6 months or so. There is no consistency, no patience for development, no time and perhaps too much pressure to build something from ground up and let it blossom. And if there is a young player with skill and talent, someone who emerged out of nowhere, who fought the odds, and overcame a non-existing youth support and development system, the European club scouts are already waiting with their check books.

Despite that fact that first division players make only a small fraction of the salaries handed out in Europe, it is still much more than the average Peruvian makes. And I am talking about the middle class in Lima, not the majority of Peruvians who have to live on less than 5 dollars a day. As it is seen many times all over Latin America, football is a very attractive way to make it out of the slums, to rise up from the basement of poverty.

Apart from punctuality, Peruvian football lacks first and foremost leadership in my opinion. Able leadership. Able and professional coaching staffs, preferably with European experience. Secure stadiums. Affordable ticket prices. A youth development program including football boarding schools. A better infrastructure. And, of course, an economy that benefits everyone.

With all these things in place, people will come. Sponsors will come. Players will be better. Team play will be better. And Peru will return to the road of success. It will take years, no doubt. And there are certainly other areas, more pressing needs in Peru’s society, than a successful football culture. But multiple improvements can go hand in hand, like a domino effect.

I know, that’s easy for me to say. I am just a writer and I don’t have a panacea either. But I am football fan.

- related articles -

Peruvian soccer hits another snag, 2007 season in jeopardy (by JP, Mar. 16, 2007)
Julio Uribe new Peruvian soccer head coach (by JP, Mar. 8, 2007)

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