It must have been the question that River fans asked themselves the most in the last three years. Because mixed between successes (many) and falls (several, some more painful than others), the Argentine idiosyncrasy leads us not to think too much in the long term. And without being Alex Ferguson, the eternal man of English Manchester United, Marcelo Gallardo it was (is) a strange matter in the sickly Argentine football.
Because of his roots with the club, because of his soccer-management-business perspective that puts him at a different height, because of the way in which he transformed a fan’s sympathy for the Player Doll into an unbreakable love of those same fans, because of the respect he generated on their campuses and how their own players assimilated the message (the messages) until they made it their own.
The dreaded day arrived. Everyone realized as soon as the winningest coach in the club’s history began to speak at a press conference called when he hadn’t spoken for a few weeks. moved. Surrounded by the main leaders and by the man who thought of him 8 years ago to replace none other than Ramón Díaz, another untouchable of the club: Enzo Francescoli. “It’s the end of my contract and I will no longer be at the club in December” was the phrase. The one that cost him the most to pronounce.
Marcelo Gallardo’s heartfelt phrase in his departure
“It was a beautiful story,” described Gallardo. It was, really. Because he took it just three years after the loss of category, he took advantage of the last boost that Ramón Díaz gave him and from there he built a glorious period. He positioned River internationally, which was almost institutional karma. He revalued the lower ones. He designed the Ezeiza property. He won titles everywhere, including the most difficult ones. He caused respect in the rivals and even in those who did not face him, but knew how to see his work, like Pep Guardiola himself. And many more. It even led the leaders to think about how to remodel the Monumental until it reached what it is today.
The Gallardo revolution also provoked a revolution in the people, which filled the field in each party, in each province that it touched. And the visitors, when Argentine soccer allowed it in the midst of its weakness and organizational capacity, at the AFA and government levels.
Gallardo accustomed people, his own followers and others, to recognize a management style, a way of facing objectives. There were few dissonant voices during his administration of more than eight years, more than enough time for a driver to generate hatred and bitterness. He had them, surely, but he knew how to treat them. And even those who left the club in a bad way later greeted him respectfully every time they passed him on the field. Obviously, something generated with his style.
Such was his success in River that the temptation immediately arose to compare him with Carlos Bianchi, an immortal of Argentine football. And without ignoring the merits of each one, they are incomparable, as Diego Maradona Y LionelMessi. Because in addition to everything he won with Boca, including the 3 Intercontinental (the elusive title for Gallardo), the Viceroy also did it with Vélez, a club smaller than the most important and conveners of Argentine football.
But the game of fanciful comparisons is not Gallardo’s fault. In any case, his own phenomenon raised him to a pedestal that only the chosen ones have access to. Although a pedestal with differential steps. What does not tarnish or subtract individual glory, which in this case is great.
Precisely Bianchi is a good measure to imagine what will be the day after. He spent in Boca, which has archived the times of international glory. He started from today in River, when Gallardo said what nobody in River wanted to hear. Even those who in recent months began to question the coach about some football decisions. The post-Gallardo era will undoubtedly be one of the most complex challenges that the club, its leadership, the drivers and the players will have to face. All. The stick was up and the memories too.
The Colombian imprint with Marcelo Gallardo in River
During his successful era at the helm of River Plate, Gallardo trained six Colombian players: Éder Álvarez Balanta, Teófilo Gutiérrez, Rafael Santos Borré, Juan Fernando Quintero, Jorge Carrascal and Miguel Ángel Borja. In fact, Santos Borré, currently with the German team Eintracht in Frankfurt, is the top scorer in his time as manager, with 55 goals.
Claudio Matterhorn
The Nation (Argentina)
GDA
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