The day Gareca’s Peru goal shook the ground in Lima and broke a 36-year spell

It happened on a Wednesday, just over five years ago. Peru drew goalless as a guest in the match played in Wellington, New Zealand, and with the home win against their rival they sparked the euphoria of thousands of fans who transformed the National Stadium in Lima at the epicenter of an expression with few precedents. Peru returned to the 2018 World Cup in Russia after 36 years, for the first time since Spain in 1982.

As the daily El Comercio rightly pointed out from the scene, the euphoria for the door of Jefferson Farfán, depending on the application Earthquake Detector, has activated “earthquake alert in Lima”. That version of apppresented as designed to warn people of such a natural disaster when it is imminent, it even went viral within minutes.

“Calm down guys”Gareca asked. To his players and also to the public in that repechage. Then, with the aim of Christian Ramos, it would become epic. in the classification, in celebration of all Peruvians, in one landmark. The earthquake gave way to everyone’s hugs.

It happens immediately after: Gareca flies in the air. In the intimacy of the changing room of the National Stadium of Lima, the tiger of Tapiales understand it forever You can’t stop being a Peruvian anymore.

He is a magician: beyond the truth of his Argentine passport, this 59-year-old boy is from Cali every time he visits Colombia and, since the night of November 15, has become Peruvian, as if he were born in Lima, in Chiclayo, in Arequipa, on the heights of Cuzco or in any other corner of beauty.

in difficult times, offered as now: caution. It was on the ledge. He was eighth until the thirteenth date of the Qualifiers. Some – from the media who then offered grandiloquent adjectives – They asked for his resignation.

Juan Carlos Oblitas -figure of the team of 82 and influential man of Peruvian football- he defended and defends him. But Above all, his players have cashed in on him. In public and in private, from Paolo Guerrero to the least known of local footballers, they have demonstrated in the name of its continuity.

From those loyalties the victories of that 2017 were born without forgetting. And with that same method he wants to reach it now.

“gareca changed his head to the players, “he told this newspaper Daniele Carandothen marker of the Royal Garcilasothe best Argentine in the Peruvian league. He was also and is amazed by the adoration that Peruvians pay to Gareca. It is no coincidence: everyone there is convinced that the Tiger It is Messi with long hair.

His magic, in this case, has an explanation. The man who is already a grandfather was the father of a miracle: Peru qualified for a World Cup for the first time since that event in Spain 1982.

“It changed our mentality. we begin to believe. Even in the worst moments he always trusted us and we trusted him “. Christian cave, San Paolo midfielder. The same one who participated in the first scene after the certainty of the Peruvian ranking for Russia 2018. Gareca hugged him and offered him a fatherly kiss.

The bond is also counted in that detail: the coach often convinced a group associated with dispersions extra-sports He understood from the word, drove without persecuting, amalgamated among the different. Now, amidst various difficulties, he goes for more. For another earthquake.

“Today Gareca could run for elections and would get 99% of the votes. Here is Messi. This is how Javier Prado can take his name from him, something like our general Paz, “he told Clarín from Lima. Matias Labat in the days of the earthquake. He is Argentine, he had been working there for four years and an astonishment appeared from the window: there was a holiday in the countryside.

It was a day of celebration. Matías then worked in a multinational. You have never seen such big smiles from your employees. “The classification of Peru it was experienced as a world title in Argentina. It was that. And it’s still now … “The party continued. None of those who work with him have seen Peru achieving two draws in their three matches in Spain 1982.

Except in the magical seventies (those of the immense Theophilus Cubillas What crack and marker), Peru did not experience happy days like in the cycle of Tiger.

the selected he won two Copa America since its first participation nine decades ago. He obtained them in 1939 and 1975. His third best tour was the bronze obtained in Chile 2015 and the final in Brazil 2019 decorated the precious journey with Gareca in charge.

In addition to the historical classification, Peru has obtained its best FIFA ranking since its foundation in 1992. He was 10th at the end of 2017.

Surprising detail: It was almost nothing to sow at the draw on the first day of December, in the Moscow Kremlin. All thanks to the magic of a Tiger capable of generating earthquakes. And to stop them. Or something similar.