The 11 Evita Morning Star champions and 10 other juniors on the Le Maine ship, bound for Finland, at the Helsinki Olympic Games in 1952.
“You can imagine what it was like for us, it was something we never dreamed of.” The testimony of Joseph Yudica in chapter 2 of the documentary series Football is history is eloquent. It refers to the trip to the Helsinki Olympic Games in 1952, for winning the football championship in lThe games to avoid of that year. In the photo, on the Le Maire boat, Yudica appears with her 10 teammates from the Evita Morning Star and 10 other juniors who have won in other sports. They sailed for unknown Finland on 11 June 1952. This Saturday marks their 70th anniversary.
It wasn’t a real tour but they were the only Argentine footballers in the Nordic countryas the AFA did not send a representative team. “The delegations that left the day before are boxing, yachting, gymnastics, weightlifting, wrestling and fencing. A delegation of children also travels with them, made up of 21 of the children who competed in Evita’s children’s tournaments. The journey of these children is an initiative of Eva Perón. They will return the beautiful prize of this trip that was bestowed on them, with the encouragement of their presence in Helsinki and tomorrow, with the fruitful result that will surely bring back the living lesson that this trip will mean for them “we read in the last paragraph of the coverage of Clarione on June 12.
This is how Clarín recounted the departure of the Argentine delegation to the Helsinki Olympic Games in 1952.
The photo is almost unknown in the world of sports. It was published by the magazine it is sporting successunder the title Álbum de Oro del Fútbol Criollo 1952. A pearl among dozens of photos of the First and Second AFA team and the main leagues in the country. The appearance of those 11 guys with professional futures was an attractive journalistic fact.
Clarin dedicated a special paragraph to the youth champions who traveled as prizes to the 1952 Helsinki Olympic Games.
Morning Star was founded in 1946, although it had already operated in the Consiglio family home since 1942. Salvador was the coach of those boys who started making noise in Rosario and in the youth soccer team since 1948, when the Evita Games started. In 1951 they reached the final but lost. After, The mayor of Rosario Celio Spirandelli suggested putting Evita’s name first. In 1952 she participated as an Evita Morning Star.
On March 15, 1952, in the Monumentale and in the presence of the president Juan Domingo Perón and Eva Perón, already very ill, the last date of the final quadrangular of the Argentine Football Championship for Children Evita, as it was called at the time. First, the representatives of Corrientes and Formosa drew 1-1. Then, the decisive match between Evita Morning Star (Santa Fe) and Arsenal de Llavallol (Buenos Aires). They also drew 1-1 but the Rosario team became champion. In the rival, that day he played Antonio Valentino Angelilloone of Dirty faces of the South American of Lima in 1957.
The story goes that when Ruben Farrugia, captain of the Morning Star, received the trophy from Evita’s hands, she asked him to name the Argentine. From then until 1955 she was Evita the Morning Star. After the coup that overthrew Perón, the club reverted to its original name.
Three of the eleven players have transcended into national football.
Yudica, who passed away in August 2021, in addition to playing for Newell’s, Boca, Vélez, Estudiantes, Platense, Quilmes and the Argentina national team, led a dozen clubs and was champion with Quilmes (Metro 78), Argentinos (Nacional 85) and Newell (1987/88).
Roberto Puppogreat friend of Louse, also made his debut at Newell’s and later played for Argentinos and Quilmes. He was also a coach, for a long time in the lower lepers.
Y Ricardo Félix Ramirez, who started in Rosario Central, also played in Unión and Paraguayan football. Meanwhile, Rubén Farrugia, the captain, became manager of Central Córdoba de Rosario in Primera B in 1968.
“When we heard over the speakers that the winners were going to the Helsinki Games, we were speechless”Yudica recalled in the book Los Juegos Evita, written by the journalist Guillermo Blanco. And I add: “We went by boat: one month to go, another there and another to return. We also took a bus to transfer there. All of us with our overcoats, our suits and even the first gabardine trousers with a zipper “.
It wasn’t a campaign promise. It was a reality. The 11 boys went to Helsinki. They left almost a month earlier. The Olympic Games took place from 19 July to 3 August. The 60 members of the Argentine delegation were the last to leave the Olympic village. They returned on August 14 and arrived in Buenos Aires on September 5. Clarione collected the testimony of those guys: “In football, marking is used a lot, but dribbling is not. The quick pass and the shot of the best placed attacker. These are the details that the members of Evita’s youth tournament delegation revealed to us, which has been a constant encouragement for the athletes ”.
This is how Clarín recounted the arrival of the Argentine delegation in Buenos Aires, after almost three months of absence, almost two voyages and more than one in Helsinki, Finland.
Eva Perón died on July 26. “While in Filandia she died and I received the telegram with the news that I passed on to everyone”, recalled Yudica, one of the 21 privileged children who had an unforgettable experience.
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Source: Clarin
