[ad_1]
With a great athletic preparation, physical display and aggressiveness without the ball sustained over time, the cardinal team seeks tonight against La Equidad their ticket to the final of Colombian football appealing to its best formula: intensity.
In the first leg (1-1) the victory was not achieved, despite the merits. But the forms, a little clouded by the refereeing, were exciting, more than anything to be seen in a context like Colombian soccer. Independiente Santa Fe came out from minute 1 to 90 to preach a commandment of well-played soccer that is summarized in a word so misunderstood in this sport: intensity.
High pressure, compact block and a pressure after suffocating loss that did not let La Equidad play their game. A more purposeful than reactive style. All with the added value that he did it as a visitor. But, above all, complying with the most difficult component of intensity: sustain it over time.
That speaks of the athletic preparation and physical deployment of Harold Rivera’s team to comply with these offensive and defensive principles of your game model. Santa Fe’s goal against La Equidad came three minutes into the game as a result of the high pressure and after loss with which they came out. A tactic that was maintained throughout the game, with its nuances, despite the fact that they played with one less footballer from minute 72, due to the expulsion of Fabián Sambueza. A duel that can be broken down with a stopwatch to count how many seconds it took the cardinal team to recover the ball. Average? Five seconds.
A “Europeanized” style, at the forefront of what is seen today in the best leagues, which has found in the Gallardo River Plate the best exponent on the continent.
One of the explanations given by the always sincere Amaranto Perea, DT del Júnior, to justify the repeated failure of the Colombian teams in the Copa Libertadores was the lack of intensity in our football. Beyond being a basic truth, it was also an avoidance of guilt: because the intensity does not depend on the environment, but on the individual. That is to say, of the daily work of each coach in his club.
A tactic that Harold Rivera has been able to capture in a Santa Fe that he resurrected and with which today he will turn 50 games, with a performance of 61.2 %. A team that spent six years in a row as host of the Copa Libertadores. The last two were absent, as a result of the mismanagement of Juan Andrés Carreño and Patricio Camps, but in 2021 the cardinal team will once again belong to Libertadores. And a team that hopes to extend its biggest home unbeaten since short tournaments are played: the account goes to 21 games.
Fabián Sambueza will not be there due to a sanction, but another of the great values that this team has is that it does not depend on a surname. They are all important, they all go for the same goal and there are no egos dizzying the picture. Thus, Kelvin Osorio became the creative figure in the face of Luis Seijas’ injury. Thus Jorge Ramos was a guarantee to score goals and manufacture them for the extremes and interiors in the absence of who until the stoppage due to the pandemic was the tournament’s top scorer: Diego Valdés. Also a wall in the middle with the synergy of Andrés Pérez and Daniel Giraldo. Solid defense with Fainer Torijano and Jeison Palacios. Spark with right-back Carlos Arboleda, so resisted in the past, and peace with Leandro Castellanos in goal. That is the backbone of Santa Fe, a team without glittering names, but well-worked and in which all row towards the same current. An atypical and modern current in Colombian soccer.
