Selection of Ecuador: a world champion DT and a former FC Barcelona coach, in command of the Tricolor

When you hear proposals for the construction of an equestrian statue of Gustavo Alfaro (to replace the one of Simón Bolívar in the Parque Seminario?) because the Argentine is supposedly a “historical hero”, what level would a world champion trainer have in the world? Ecuador bench?

And if it is about asking questions here, here are a couple: would Lionel Scaloni, winner of the 2022 World Cup with Argentina, accept today that the next team under his command is the Ecuadorian? Or could a Catalan with a notable past as a player and coach of FC Barcelona, ​​like Xavi Hernández, for example, be the manager of La Tricolor?

“Ricardo Gareca becomes insane,” they say in Peru for estimating that he is asking the FEF for more than $3.7 million

Two characters who respond to these characteristics led the Selection in times when, unlike the present, the status of history was not granted to just anyone. And both protagonists of this note set milestones for football in the country.

Gustavo Alfaro’s farewell letter must go to the garbage can

None of the applicants mentioned by the current leadership of the FEF as probable trainers of Ecuador has the possibility of competing with the solid universal prestige that Juan López Fontana exhibited when he arrived in Guayaquil. Nor have the applicants cited by Francisco Egas been on the bench of a giant squad in Europe, such as Josep Planas Artes.

Francisco Egas: Ricardo Gareca and Sebastián Beccacece are ideal candidates, but we do not rule out any other name to lead the National Team

Fedenador brought them

Until well into the previous century, the National Sports Federation of Ecuador was the entity responsible for managing the National Team (the Ecuadorian Football Federation did not exist. Nor is it Fedenador, an organization still in force, predecessor of the FEF, and they have no relationship between Yeah). Without the demagogic pomp with which Jordi Cruyff was presented in 2020 (“a process that will make us a world soccer power”), and almost in silence, Planas and López arrived to record their names in history.

Fedenador agreed with Planas (1901-1977) to lead the National Team in the 1949 Copa América in Brazil. He came with an extensive resume that included having commanded Racing Ferrol, Arenas, Murcia, Celta, La Coruña, Zaragoza, FC Barcelona, ​​Valladolid, Sant Andreu and Espanyol, where he came from. Pepe Planas, as he was called, was not unknown in Spain.

First win in Copa América

Ecuador finished in penultimate place, with six losses and one win in the 1949 Copa América. But that only victory is historic: it was the first for the Tricolor in its participation in that Conmebol event. Colombia was thrashed 4-1.

On May 3, 1949, at the Sao Januario stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Pepe Planas sent Félix Torres to the field; Carlos Sanchez, Marcos Bermeo; Ricardo Riveros, Jorge Cantos, Hernan Salgado; Marcos Spencer (Víctor Arteaga), Enrique Cantos (César Garnica), José Maldonado, José Fluff Vargas, Guido Andrade. The bullfighters Cantos (2), Vargas and Andrade scored.

Planas returned to Spain after that tournament and worked until 1963, when he retired at Sabadell. His professional relevance and the appreciation with which he is remembered at FC Barcelona can be seen in the text that appears on the club’s official website.

Tribute of the Barça

“Once he retired from the world of football, where he was an outstanding player for the Barcelona entity from 1921-1927, Josep Planas dedicated himself to training. After his good performances in front of modest teams, like Ferrol, he came to Barça. He was a true innovator, since he was ahead of his time and applied new game systems. He was the first Barcelona coach to change training methods. Unfortunately, he had a very difficult time for Barça, that of the first post-war period (1939-1941), with the team diminished and the club under suspicion of the Franco dictatorship. Josep Planas was the founder of the Barcelona Veterans Association, which included former players from all the city’s clubs, ”he reads.

From the Maracanazo to the Tri

In 1959, Fedenador, chaired by Federico Muñoz Medina, delivered a coup that today would be impossible to emulate. The director brought the coach of Uruguay to the Tricolor in the memorable conquest of the 1950 World Cup, in the feat carried out against the local team, Brazil. The one that was immortalized as Maracanazo.

Signed to direct in Copa América in Guayaquil 1959, “his work must be considered good; For the first time physically the Ecuadorian representation was not in inferior conditions with respect to its adversaries; (López) provided our cast with a modern game system for the time; and he achieved two historic results: he drew 1-1 with Argentina, something never produced in the previous 20 years of competing in continental tournaments; and they beat Paraguay for the first time 3-1″, says López Mauro Velásquez in his book Ecuadorian football and its national team.

López landed in Guayaquil on Sunday, October 25, 1959, and that same night he started working. He went to the Modelo stadium to watch the Emelec-Everest match, for the Asoguayas championship.

‘key man’

EL UNIVERSO said this, on October 16, 1959, in the news of the arrival of the world champion: “After an unsettling wait, the key man of the national soccer team arrived, the Uruguayan coach Juan López, on whom the sports care in the country. From the review that we are going to do of the interview that we did with him, we could deduce the robust personality and intellectual capacity of this soccer master. His contract constitutes a positive guarantee for our National Team ”.

López announced “strict controls” of the “physical and mental capacities” of the campus. He declared that his intention was to “form the best group so that the name of Ecuador is well placed (…). I will defend the sports colors of Ecuador with the same enthusiasm and affection that I always do with the light blue jacket”.

FIFA, on its website, remembers him like this: “Juan López Fontana, the coach behind the Maracanazo, was a man of faith, so much so that he even dedicated himself, in his spare time, to being a catechist. But before being a DT, he had also been a Physical Education teacher ”. Juancito, as he was nicknamed, also holds fourth place in Suiza 1954 and two stars with Peñarol.

doubly historic

With López, Ecuador obtained its first point in a duel with Argentina, which at that time already had twelve Copa América crowns, a world runner-up and an Olympic silver medal in soccer. It was 1-1 in the Model; Carlos Raffo put La Tri ahead and Rubén Sosa tied.

Of the match held on December 12, 1959, in the Model, EL UNIVERSO reported: “We did not ask for or give quarter. Good boys, good Ecuadorians all. The fourteen who last night wore a uniform that needed that consecration, and those who were on the sidelines of the field, cheering as one man. We were able to shout at the top of our chests, in the plural: we tied”.

López’s historic category in national football was extended when Fedenador commissioned him to be the DT in Ecuador’s first intervention towards a World Cup, that of Chile 1962. 18 dates were not disputed, the format was not used all against all and in just two games the National Team was dismissed.

López is “the best coach who has set foot on our courts,” according to a text published by Carlos Cherrez Gómez and Manuel Ocaña Dorado in this newspaper in 1959. (D)