Wanchope: Costa Rica's self-destruction

   Paulo César Wanchope's resignation from managing the Costa Rica national team following his street-fighting in Panamá is but the last episode in that side's saga of tragic self-destruction.

Saliently enough, the most common remarks made by Costa Ricans immediately after the last World Cup's feats against both Uruguay and Italy were recriminations to journalists and federation politicians back home. In those post-match interviews in Salvador da Bahia and Recife, the likes of Celso Borges and Yeltsin Tejeda did mention their own hard work and endless self-belief, but did so only after lambasting those who disbelieved and actually benefited personally from them. Jorge Luis Pinto, the Colombian coach now in Honduras, took every chance he had to speak by mouthfuls what now seems credible about then Costa Rican Federation president Eduardo Li.

Downplayed by the lengthy corruption records of Jack Warner, Jeffrey Webb and Chuch Blazer, the name of Eduardo Li has drawn proportionally little media attention perhaps as consequence of his name being quoted just 17 times within the pages of the US Department of Justice's indictment against nine FIFA officials (Warner's name appears 47 times; Blazer's, under the title of "Co Conspirator #1", 50 times). According to the Attorney General's Office, which charges Li with racketeering and wire-fraud conspiracies, the former president of the Costa Rican Federation had personally solicited for cash in exchange of the broadcasting rights of home World Cup qualifiers. Point number 202 of the indictment says: "During the negotiations, LI asked Co Conspirator #4 for a six-figure bribe in exchange for his agreement to award the contract to Traffic USA. After obtaining approval within Traffic, Co-Conspirator #4 agreed to the payment and caused it to be made." At the moment, Li remains on Swiss soil fighting extradition.

What should have been the triggering moment towards further greatness for a small Central-American nation became instead the beginning of political dogfights and footballing misery. Costa Ricans can legitimately argue that their national team's quarter-finals exit from the 2015 Gold Cup was due to poor, if not overtly bad intentioned, refereeing against Mexico with the award of that last minute penalty kick, but up to that game Costa Rica remained the gray shadow of the 2014 side: unable to defeat Canada, El Salvador and Jamaica. Involution.

Things to come within Costa Rica's near future equally appear full of gloom and doom. Los Ticos have been seeded in the qualifying Group of Death with likely rivals being Jamaica, Panama and Haiti. All three teams manifested bigger tactical cohesion and organization and will surely pose a serious threat to great, but now unmanaged, Costa Rican stars such as Keylor Navas, Joel Campbell, Giancarlo González, Bryan Ruiz and promising youngster David Ramírez. 

Perhaps the short, unknown -oblivious to matters of height and weight- guy who dare to punch and kick Wanchope comes as the perfect analogy of things to come for Costa Rica: any former minion will compete on the pitch against a now dispirited and disarrayed Costa Rica. Times in San José resemble less the face of Celso Borges after beating Italy and more the face of Eduardo Li behind bars in Zurich.