Hernán Darío Herrera sat in the press room with an overwhelming, irrepressible smile. The smile that drew his face was not only happy, it was also proud, that mischievous laugh that those who get away with it have. He had just completed his mission: to lead Atlético Nacional to glory, and that many doubted, and that many did not believe him. Herrera went from the ungrateful position of interim coach, to sitting in that press chair as the champion coach, for the whole country to confirm. That’s why it was his laughter before the cameras, that’s why that overflowing joy.
Herrera wore the champion’s medal around his neck, with a blue ribbon and a gold tip. It is not uncommon for him to have slept with it on. No wonder he still has it hanging there. That’s what champion medals are for, to show them off to the world, and why not, also in front of the mirror. He was also wearing his black shirt that says, in white letters, and right on his proudly inflated chest, Arriero soy!, like someone who wants that to be clear, that no one forgets. This is how they know him in football since he was a player (this is how the narrator Jorge Eliécer Campuzano baptized him). The muleteer is a tireless worker, like a good muleteer. Soccer player day and night, awake and asleep.
The fight of the Arriero
Today he is 64 years old and has just achieved his most important achievement as a coach. And to think that the position was not for him, and to think that he was named an emergency, by the way, a provisional seat, an emergency tire when Alejandro Restrepo did not continue to lead, after the elimination in the Copa Libertadores. Herrera, the same one who seems like the father and son of that team, who has led the minor divisions so many times, had to herd the biggest figures, those who weren’t around at the time, stars who were kind of off, and they immediately understood his slogan, the goal was to win the title in three months, no matter how.
But the road was tortuous. The opportunity did not come in gift paper. “What has happened in Nacional with me has been very hard for me. I’ve had a lot of sadness because of what I had to go through in the last year, I’m directing ‘de arepa’ because I didn’t have a team in the minors, I don’t know who wanted to remove me from there and, from one moment to another, they called me to direct the professional and it was a good challenge”, commented the Muleteer on Sunday, like that, frankly, without filters in his voice or in his soul or in his eyes.
They didn’t believe Herrera, who knows if they believe him now. He sees everything in football. He and his team endured criticism, insults, ruthless attacks, that because Nacional was not Nacional, that they did not respect history, that they did not play nice. And yet, Nacional was riding, armed with a green armor called hierarchy. The Muleteer got away with it. “For the whole world, Nacional is a champion, they played badly, I don’t know what, they don’t have Nacional’s DNA, Gio received the cup, five years ago he was looking for the trophy and he won it today. Those who did not want Nacional to be champion, today they are champions and they are enjoying it”, said the coach.
The curious thing is that Herrera is no stranger to good football. In his time as a player, with that same green shirt, and with others, he played fantasy football. An extraordinary player, and with a goal, twice champion with Nacional, four times champion with América. With passage through the Colombian National Team. Talking about the Herrera player is talking about good football. As a coach he was champion of the B with Real Cartagena, he played the final of the A in 2005, lost against Cali; In Nacional he won a Colombia Cup, in 2018, that year when he was once again a spare tire and was abruptly removed; he also headed to America, Bucaramanga and Pasto. He now faced his greatest challenge, not knowing if they were going to leave him until the end.
‘Nacional pays me to win’
Before the final against Tolima and again in the press room, not with joy but with tension, Herrera stated that they had not left him in charge to play nice, that Nacional did not pay him for that, he said it that way, in his direct style: “I am paid to win”. And for that he dedicated his mind and his efforts. And how much do they pay you? A curious unknown. A fact that could be minor, private, but in this case it was not. On Sunday, after winning the title against Tolima, a journalist asked him the question: How much do you earn? And the Muleteer smiled nervously, as if he didn’t know what to say so as not to say badly what can be badly said. “The salary thing, if I tell you about the salary, you don’t believe me…”, said the Muleteer and let out a timid laugh.
Giovanni Moreno, the idol of the club, interceded for him. He put a hand on his back and said: “He is the champion coach and he is the one who earns the least in professional football, of all of them, I am very sure. I told him before the game, he earned it hard, let’s hope he continues with us and they recognize this. How many technicians pass through here earning fortunes, and this man was there, he lived it from below… ”.
Gio was emboldened and told intimacies. “People don’t know his story, because they don’t like to talk about him, but they sent him to walk there to Plaza Botero (Medellín)… It hit him hard, that’s why I’m happy for him, the situation he experienced. I don’t need to tell him, because he was already going to retire me, but he deserves to be allowed to work, to be paid what he should earn”.
I did not know that this person is now the champion with Nacional, so let’s continue walking through Botero Square.
That of Botero square was a day that Herrera made a claim to a leader of Nacional. The leader, more words, less words, told him that if he didn’t like it that way, there were many people walking through Plaza Botero. “I did not know that this person is now the champion with Nacional, so let’s continue walking through Botero Square. It was a great pain when I heard that phrase, but hey, these are things that happen to one”, said the Muleteer, who, as Gio asked, would continue to lead the team. It is something that was earned by hand.
Herrera is a man who sometimes seems good-natured, capable of distributing brandy in a press room, or scolding, of those who do not keep quiet about anything; he is also the one who uses tape on his hands to counteract the tension of being National’s DT. But what really identifies him, in addition to the medal around his neck, is that black shirt that reminds him of what he really is: a champion Muleteer.
PAUL ROMERO
Editor of THE TIME
@PabloRomeroET
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