Colombia lives the World Cup from home, on television, while the group stage is defined. Iran, under the command of Carlos Queiroz, was eliminated in the third game, after the loss against the United States.
The memory of the strategist in the Colombian environment is still latent, since the process that left the tricolor without going to the World Cup began, despite the fact that their numbers were not bad. In an interview with the Colombian media, in the mixed zone after the game against the North Americans, he was questioned about the tricolor.
Sincere, but at the same time diplomatic, the Portuguese strategist spoke of the lack of the tricolor in the competition, in addition, of the complications suffered at that time “Colombia deserved to be in the World Cup, with the players they have. If you remember correctly, the second round games of the Playoffs came at a crazy time. The preparation, the players who stayed in Europe who did not play, everything around the covid have been crazy ”.
“The opinion that I had was that when we played the second round of the Qualifiers, it was that Colombia was not in a position to play, due to the preparation, those who did not arrive, it was not the moment. The decision was made and that was respectable” he added about the level that the players had, with extra-sports complications.
complemented “Remember that, in the morning, I test, before training, I test, you couldn’t get to training because there was a positive. Arriving at a World Cup without training, because you are in the hotel doing tests, it was not the best”.
He also referred to the new process, under the command of Néstor Lorenzo “The future is always better, the people who arrive will take the lessons from the past. They won’t make the same mistakes”.
He concluded his speech, without mentioning other factors, but leaving in the air that there were more incidents and factors that ended up truncating the process that began with Colombia, even referring to that last commitment, adding factors as a result of the pandemic and the restrictions “It was not the only thing, but it greatly delayed the quality and performance of the team. Some of the players were almost a year without coming to the country. When they returned from Europe for a game, their families and friends had an emotional need to be together. In the last game they arrived in Colombia to return to Europe. The worst thing that happened is that the players’ heads weren’t right”.