Where is Messi's extraordinary gift for hope?

There is a big, yet barely noticed, generational divide among football fans. Namely, the gap between adults whose biggest dreams had to do with lifting the World Cup, and teenagers and children currently sighing for Champions League and Ballon d'Or glory.

Born in 1987, Lionel Messi stands at the crossroads between the past and the future. The many hailing him as the best footballer of history are, basically, those who didn't have contact with his predecessors, and those grown-up pundits whose most profitable subject is everyday's European club football. Cristiano Ronaldo, in stark contrast to Messi, already lives comfortably in the future. His is not an historical debate (Eusébio achieved little with Portugal) and quite possibly his fellow countrymen know exactly what the current Real Madrid star can achieve internationally.

But Messi comes from Argentina. Had he been born in Northern Ireland or Wales, the historical debates surrounding him would be reduced into historical regrets: George Best and Ryan Giggs were authentic legends whose national teams did them no favors. Indeed, there are voices inside and outside Argentina trying to mute the national debate by imposing this sort of regrets taken from the Messi experience at club level. "Argentines just can't realize that La Albiceleste should imitate FC Barcelona. If not, bad for them; we, the rest of the world, anyway enjoy him in our screens showing the packed Camp Nou".

A parcel of the Argentine people, nonetheless, refuses to nod to this kind of opinions without defending themselves before by invoking their own history, feats and heroes. Maradona, "the most human of Gods", as the late Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano called him, is ridiculed with ease around the globe due to well-known addictions, populist political allegiances and, more recently, visible plastic surgeries. Diego, at least inside his fatherland, at least amongst those who are well past their youth, has in his favor the achievement of that something which represented the hope of everyone back in the 20th century: the World Cup trophy.

Jay Gatsby, The Great Gatsby, couldn't fulfill his own dream in spite of walking all the way from poverty to richness in order to make it come true. Yet, he will forever appear as the owner of a "heightened sensitivity to the promises of life... an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness as I have never found in any other person and which it is not likely I shall ever find again", said of him his friend, Nick Carraway. Maradona represents a Gatsby who finally could make it, who could thus indulge in all the promises of worldly life after historical glory.

Then, where is Messi's own extraordinary gift for hope? As from the last lines of Gatsby, this extraordinary gift for hope means that " tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther…. And one fine morning." Like Maradona, Messi shall have to run faster, stretch out his arms farther and, furthermore, start doing all that which he never does in Spain: tackles, interceptions, aerial duels, miles and miles backwards at helping his teammates defensively. To stain his face with mud, and perhaps his legs with blood. Whether the hope of the past will keep eluding him or not, that's really no matter.

The compelling matter is the surrender of hope by means of isolating himself in the safe haven of Champions League football and of Ballon d'Or red carpets, where his suits produce more buzz than his goals against Eibar or Granada. That form of isolation would be like getting trapped voluntarily into the past and by the past. A bizarre, cynical version of Jay Gatsby.

Elogio de Gary Lineker

Como la BBC no tiene los derechos de los grandes torneos de clubes, lo mejor de Gary Lineker, su comentarista estrella, aparece verano con verano cuando hay fútbol de selecciones. En Inglaterra existe una división entre fanáticos harto conocida: quienes prefieren a su club (usualmente gente de ciudades grandes con equipos tradicionales como el Everton o el Newcastle), y quienes viajan apoyando a Los Tres Leones (habitantes de ciudades menos grandes sin club de primera; por ello en las banderas aparecen los nombres de "Bristol", "Reading", "Taunton" y no "Manchester" ni "Liverpool"). A éstos se dirige Lineker básicamente.

¿Puede Inglaterra ganar el próximo Mundial?, fue el nombre de un documental presentado por él mismo, aparecido tras el bochornoso 4-1 que Alemania le propinó al entonces cuadro de Fabio Capello en Sudáfrica 2010. "Can England win the next World Cup? Gary Lineker goes in search of answers" se anunciaba así, porque hizo eso y nada más: viajar a España, hablar con Zubizarreta, con Piqué, Cruyff y Mourinho; ir con el mandamás de la federación inglesa y también al piso más alto de la sede de la Premier League en búsqueda de respuestas de quienes mueven los hilos del fútbol inglés. Con voz preocupada y seria, Lineker va planteando el problema de problemas y elabora su propia narrativa:

"Ésta es la misma enfermedad que ha evitado que alcancemos cualquier logro notable por más de 44 años".

Tercer máximo goleador histórico del equipo nacional y jamás infraccionado siquiera con una tarjeta amarilla, la autoridad moral que el Lineker futbolista le heredó al Lineker presentador hubiera bastado para hacer de él uno como tantos más: un comentarista hablando por inercia, automáticamente, sin audacia ni investigación, sin entrevistar ni hablar otro idioma. Respuestas comunes a una crisis futbolística tales como la falta de talento joven, de una idea de juego, exceso de extranjeros, la nostalgia por épocas mejores que no volverán y la crítica al negocio-fútbol aparecen todas en su documental. Pero, aparecen con una salvedad: están jerarquizadas dentro de una narración coherente -causa y efecto-, no aventadas aleatoriamente.

Comentar fútbol es un juego de retórica. De aventurar una explicación (¿por qué Inglaterra ya no gana nada?) y esperar que dicha explicación convenza a la gente. El comentario futbolístico parte de la premisa de que es esencialmente democrático: todos podemos hacerlo, aunque la opinión del ex-futbolista tendrá más peso que la del twittero o la del bloguero por motivos de mero poder carismático. El carisma, sin embargo, no debería bastar para hacer de un comentario una explicación indisputable:

Un comentario es cuando se entrega al lector una percepción como "verdad" sin preocuparse en informarlo sobre las tensiones de las cuales surgió esta "verdad". La afirmación se hace sin los medios para evaluar su validez.

Lineker pegó el salto de calidad porque llevó el comentario a la zona del auténtico periodismo a través de ese constante "ir en busca de respuestas". Se vale de su experiencia previa en los campos, sí, y de su trabajo comunicativo fuera de ellos, también. Así pues el ex-delantero del Leicester, renombrado en los ochenta por su hambre goleadora y su fino olfato de área, es hoy uno de los mejores comentaristas de fútbol cuya curiosidad insaciable le lleva a por nuevas historias allá donde estén. 

¿Podrá Inglaterra ganar el próximo mundial? Esperemos que no. De lo contrario, el problema que Lineker ha intentado resolver de una y mil formas, dentro y fuera de la cancha, habría quedado resuelto y su curiosidad habría quedado satisfecha. Y todos queremos más veranos así, con banderas inglesas con los nombres de Bristol, Taunton o Reading.

¿De verdad fueron las rotaciones?

    La humillante eliminación mexicana de la Copa América Centenario empezó en los botines de Gary Medel. Corrían los primeros 20 minutos del choque cuando el Pitbull había proyectado ya un par de pelotas largas buscando la espalda de la dupla de centrales mexicanos. La primera de ellas forzó una barrida de último hombre de Néstor Araujo mandando a córner mientras la segunda exhibió a Héctor Moreno corriendo hacia atrás para el 1-0 de La Roja. Evidentemente, Osorio dispuso jugar con la línea defensiva muy adelante para presionar la salida desde atrás por tierra de los de Juan Antonio Pizzi.

¿Cuál fue la respuesta del campeón defensor? Salir desde atrás, pero por aire. Las primeras veces fue Medel, algunas Marcelo Díaz, otras el Rey Arturo, y algunas, menos acertadas, fueron de Claudio Bravo: todas buscando la superioridad en velocidad y en técnica de recepción de Alexis Sánchez y Edu Vargas sobre sus marcadores. Un éxito rotundo.

La equivocación de Osorio no fue de método (rotar alineación o no rotarla), sino de estrategia (jugar adelantado o esperar organizado atrás). El patrón táctico del 7-0, por ejemplo, fue sorprendentemente similar al de las golizas que solía llevarse el técnico portugués André Villas-Boas en su fugaz paso por la Liga Premier dirigiendo al Chelsea y al Tottenham. El blog británico de debate táctico, ZonalMarking, concluyó sobre la propuesta fallida del portugués y sobre su despido tras un 5-0 frente al Liverpool de Luis Suárez:

[Jugar con línea defensiva adelantada] es la característica definitoria de su estilo como entrenador, y aunque no es una táctica equivocada por sí misma, Villas-Boas repetidamente la usó en situaciones donde no cuadraba bien con sus propios jugadores, regalando mucho al rival. Eso, en otras palabras, es lo opuesto al objetivo de la táctica...

A pesar de que el debate de las rotaciones es el ariete más popular para golpear la joven gestión de Osorio, una crítica mucho más robusta a sus decisiones es que él pecó de obstinado por no adaptar su idea al material humano a su disposición, en vista sobre todo del material humano del rival. Jugar adelantado requiere de futbolistas capaces de cumplir con funciones adicionales a las que dicta su posición. Con el 0-0 aún en el marcador, México lanzó un trazo largo para buscar la espalda del propio Medel y fue entonces que Bravo salió de su área, bajó la pelota con el pecho para hacerse de ella y salió jugando por abajo vía Gonzalo Jara.

El fiasco significa reconocer los límites de los jugadores mexicanos seleccionables. Y también los límites que esto impone sobre los modos en que México puede jugar. Hay defensas disciplinados pero desorientados a campo abierto, porteros con mucha reacción bajo palos pero sin juego de pies, medios fantásticos que como por acto de magia desaparecen, delanteros letales dentro del área desprovistos de las virtudes para salir de ella. Los recursos futbolísticos del Tri obligan a otras estrategias. Los pies en la tierra.

Bien podría pedirse la cabeza de Osorio y traer en su reemplazo a alguna de las mentes maestras de la táctica contemporánea como Diego Simeone o Massimo Allegri y, no obstante, habrían de vérselas con la misma materia prima. Si el mea culpa del técnico colombiano es sincero y ha aprendido la amarga lección, conservarlo en el cargo al menos garantizará decisiones más sensatas y respuestas menos rebuscadas frente a la prensa. A final de cuentas la paliza que se llevó su equipo nos la llevamos y merecemos todos nosotros también.

How to understand Izazola's decision within Liga Mx?

   Czech writer Milan Kundera has some pages of his first novel, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, explaining why he fled his own country. Himself a member of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party, Kundera did not depart on occasion of the Soviet invasion in 1968, but did so only until 1975 when he went into exile in France, where he settled for good. Why did he take so long to run away from oppression?

The announcement, doubly surprising, made by Pumas UNAM's graduate, David Izazola, about ending his professional career at just 24 years old was hotly debated in social media with some commending and others turning against. It was doubly surprising since the winger (who received some caps for national underage sides in the past) had already been forgotten by almost everyone and because, with that age, it is still very possible to have decent contracts in the lower tiers of the domestic league.

In his tweeted announcement, Izazola referred to a "system made for foreigners in which decisions are taken on grounds of profits and business and not on skills and talent". These lines would represent volcanic critiques to decision-makers of Liga Mx after the approval of laws allowing top-flight clubs to field squads packed with foreign resources. Although lately the discussion about the scarcity of Mexican youngsters making a lasting impact had narrowed to "Mexicans vs Foreigners and Naturalizados", this time Izazola's decision moved the conversation onto another shocking direction.

"Please don't dramatize: had he been a good player, he surely would have made it big. Talent shows itself"-, "It's very coward to blame others for your own failures "-, "Giving up your dreams? If these are indeed your dreams you will do whatever it takes to fulfill them"-. The "not-too-good" rant at Izazola, nevertheless, strengthens the cause of those who made the new rules in Liga Mx. Should this be the case (that every Izazola in Mexico is deserving of his gloomy fate), then the only legitimate criticism to the new rulings must be about their very late arrival. Here, Izazola's experience is a confirmation of the urgent need of more and more signings from abroad.

The real question, however, is not whether Izazola had a poor level or not, the real question is: why did he take so long to escape from a system that, has he claims, is merciless with Mexican youngsters?

Explaining his exit from his fatherland, Kundera uses one expression, "circle dancing", to make allusion to the Czechoslovakian class of privileged intellectuals united around Communist Party membership. Kundera was aware of the atrocities of 1968 onwards, and was also aware of the persecution suffered by some of his friends who were reluctant to "circle dancing". He remained a party member almost until his exile, though, since the dance allowed him and others to keep together as a closed group and to look the other way at Communist abuses. "Circle dancing", furthermore, meant fun and play:

Then I became conscious of the circle's magical meaning. If we get out from the line, we can get back in. The line is an open formation. But the circle is closed and there's no possible return.

More than putting an end to his career, Izazola has taken the uncertain choice of getting out from the circle (what's next for him now?). The circle of Mexican youngsters and former youngsters is nowadays comprised by champions and runners-up of junior FIFA tournaments who enjoy first-world salaries while being benched game after game. Some of them watch Liga Mx in box seats, behind acrylic glass, eating popcorn as their teammates play. "Circle dancing" might mean money and joy but no play. And soccer players are so called because they play soccer, just like intellectuals are so called because they use their intellect.

Kundera perhaps took so long to flee as he realized that "circle dancing" meant everything except thinking. Izazola perhaps took so long to retire as he realized "circle dancing" means anything except playing soccer. The real drama is not his particular case. The real drama is the one of those who are already retired and don't even know it.

Chicharito: Mexico's newest idea of violence

Argentine storyteller Jorge Luis Borges used to contend that authentic metaphors have already been invented. Regarding new ones, either they are weak or are little more than remakes of the classics. "True [metaphors], those which formulate intimate connections between one image and another, have always existed", he wrote. Cooling down a hot potato ("Sacar las papas del fuego", a common expression in Spanish which smoothly translates to English), for instance, is just as useful as timeless: it works due to the linkage between the image of the difficulty which is solved at any time in any place with that of the burning potato.

If we are to explain the commonly held belief amongst Mexicans that Mexico barely stands out in good things (without using that many words), then we should ask the safe help from the ubiquitous metaphor of The Crab Bucket. They will get it: seeing the lone crustacean at its useless struggle against its peers in order to connect this scene with whatever political, economic or cultural traits are considered characteristic of Mexican society. The Mexican man never excels, because the Mexican men are going to take him down.

Although it might well apply to fellow countrymen of success like filmmaker Alejandro González Iñárritu, the social critique suggested by the Crab Mentality does it better to the soccer star Javier Hernández's career. The more popular and more familiar, the more useful. Those good and bad seasons through which the tireless young man from Jalisco has remained in Europe without falling prey of surrender have taken him beyond the place of mere sporting figure: he now personifies the idea, powerful and appealing, according to which his fatherland can no longer be compared to a bucket full of hideous crabs. Some of them could still survive, far too many perhaps. But in the times of  Negro Iñárritu and Chichadiós, the metaphor shall be absolutely obsolete.

Metaphors do much more than simplifying the complex. They function as this simplification is done by means of a contrast, imagination and reality. Mexico is not The Crab Bucket given that neither all vices can be imputed onto all of a country's inhabitants nor those vices can be exclusive national property: metaphors like these simultaneously portray all of the world's societies and none of them. By becoming the archetype of the success of Mexico, the Javier Hernández idea moreover blurs our metaphor's contrast and leaves it as another cliché. Another unworthy commonplace that revolves in half truths and fallacies... The archetype gives Mexicans the strongest of cases for finally saying, "Yes, we can".

In terms of winning hearts rather than winning minds, archetypes crush metaphors. The contrast between imagination and reality gets replaced by a contradiction, a clash of opposites with no room to nuances: just as the accepted archetype of beauty defines ugliness by opposition. Values against anti-values; good Mexicans against bad Mexicans. One necessary analysis of the Chicharito idea in the country where crabs keep moving sideways must ask for who these are (the bunch of those envious, resentful, mediocre, jobless and idle that wander in the streets and proliferate within social media), and, what is more, must ask too for what banners are lifted by the newest national archetype itself: the cult of success, the self-indulgence, the work made in order to shut mouths, the unfettered vanity. The belligerent side of strong hearts must subdue the side of lazy hearts.

Metaphors, however, can reach further than archetypes when it comes to winning minds and hearts. The Crab Bucket is as much a critique to every social vice as the concept of Chauvinism encloses an ever-pertinent critique to archetypes which suspiciously wrap reasons into flags. A word of French origin, Chauvinist copes with one bizarre offshoot of nationalism which, besides, translates to other languages, though its arrival South of the Rio Grande seems forever delayed.

Questioning whether the twice Oscar-winning director makes films that are rich in photography but poor in narrative; or questioning the fair merit of netting handfuls of goals in contrast to assistances to other teammates which can be counted with less than five fingers, is more often than not understood as the crab treason toward the archetype of Mexican excellence. It is so understood in the place where there is no self/social critique, Chauvinism, Jingoism.

As Borges rightly contended, the power of metaphorical language brings us to look into the intimacy of two juxtaposed images: The Crab Bucket is one for reflection on whole societies and not on random groups of individuals. This Chicharito idea, turned into archetype of social rhetoric, more than to describe is dedicated to judge people on arbitrary criteria. Good and bad countrymen we are, no matter how many first-touch goals inside the penalty area of a soccer field are needed to make us submissive and silent.

@Cesarkickoff