Jorge Griffa, the champion who discovered Valdano, Bati and Balbo and boosted the careers of Bielsa and Pochettino

As if fate had entered the scene, on the same day that Lionel Messi received his third The Best, Jorge Griffa died, the man who made Newell’s grow (where Leo took his first steps and keeps part of his heart) since since its formation. when they stopped being footballers.

“Coque”, they called him as a boy in Casilda, where he was born, about 50 kilometers from Rosario. “Master”, they called him because he dedicated himself to the lower divisions. If a teacher is measured by what his students are, that nickname was well earned by the man who left this world at the age of 88. Since yesterday, football has been indebted to that maestro who planted stars on Argentine fields and precious coaches in various teams.

“We are deeply sorry for the death of Jorge Bernardo Griffa. The Maestro, undisputed symbol of Newell’s, was a player, youth coach and creator of the leper outbreak that gave enormous sums to the world. Your legacy will always be part of our history, rest in peace”, was the statement with which Newell’s broke the news of Griffa’s death.

“Jorge, I want to be a coach”, told him a young man who wasn’t afraid to face Griffa when he managed the Rossoneri’s inferior teams. Griffa knew him well. “You will train in the First Division, but first you will work with me and when the time comes, you will make the leap,” the man told him. The young man, who was very young, accepted and took refuge. To learn. That young man was Marcelo Bielsa.

He accompanied the Fool throughout his learning phase. Even when Bielsa was already coach of Newell’s Primera. Together they have countless anecdotes. Perhaps the most striking thing is the “discovery” of Chelsea’s current technical director.

Griffa and Bielsa had received information that in a small town in Santa Fe called Murphy there was a young man “class of 72” who was six feet tall and was a striker in a club in the area. Griffa and Bielsa drove to Murphy and they arrived almost at dawn. They knocked on the house that had been indicated to them and the teenager’s parents welcomed them, telling them that the boy was already sleeping. Griffa and Bielsa asked the hosts not to wake him but they just wanted to see his legs. They made them go to the bedroom, carefully moved the blankets and the Master and the Fool smiled. He had the legs of a footballer. A few days later they sent a telegram summoning Mauricio Pochettino to attend Newell’s youth training.

Griffa was a center forward. A 2, according to the denominations of the time. He was Newell’s number 2 between 1954 and 1959 until his move to Europe. Transoceanic transfers were not common in those days. You had to be very good for a European club to want to sign a player. Whoever wanted it wasn’t wrong. Griffa was the central defender of Atlético de Madrid from his arrival until 1969, then he played two years with Espanyol and ended his career as a footballer.

What to do then? “I wanted to be a coach and I realized that he wasn’t for me and I dedicated myself to the lower divisions”, he said in countless interviews.

From the back of Atlético’s defence, he helped them win several titles, forming a solid block with club legends such as Calleja and Rivilla.

He was champion of the Generalissimo Cup, predecessor of the current Copa del Rey in 1960, 1961 and 1965. He was champion of the Spanish championship in 1965-66. He was champion of the then Cup Winners’ Cup in 1965.

With the Argentine national team he was champion of the 1959 South American Championship in which the Albiceleste beat Pelé’s Brazil, newly won World Cup in Sweden the previous year.

He left a legacy at Atlético. He recommended Iselín Santos Ovejero, from Vélez, also an emblem of the red and white defense. Then came the turn of Brazilian Luiz Pereira, another star. In his ten years at Aleti he was the foreigner with the most appearances for the club where he made 291 appearances.

When he joined the smaller divisions of Newell’s, he patiently and unhurriedly began to irrigate the prolific land. From their hands they came Jorge Valdano, Gerardo Martino, Ricardo Giusti, Gabriel Batistuta, Abel Balbo and Mauricio Pochettinoto mention only the best known.

He had his own technique. Buenos Aires clubs bought players. Griffa, however, went to look for them on the outskirts of Rosario and inland and took them to the club. The clubs of origin were guaranteed compensation if the player reached the First Division.

When Marcelo Bielsa formed that champion team in the early 1990s, all the players had passed through his hands in the youth ranks. Griffa gave Bielsa the raw material. And, after all, he had already “educated” Bielsa as a coach. It wasn’t much. He also ordered the conditioning of the Bella Vista property which bears his name.

When Mauricio Macri took over as president of Boca he brought him to his club. From these inferiors came Ever Banega, Sebastián Battaglia, Fernando Gago, Carlos Tevez, Neri Cardozo, Nicolás Burdisso and Pablo Ledesma, among others. After a decade at Boca, he was in Independiente (he promoted Esequiel Barco), in Mexico and since 2019 he has been director of youth recruitment at Newell’s.