Victory Continues to Escape All Stars
by Rod Hughes
Head coach Hernan Medford’s job is still safe—for now—despite an 11-game losing streak. The most recent defeat for Costa Rica’s national team came Wednesday in an exhibition game in South America, losing to Peru 3-1. (Fortunately, the match was not aired on TV here because of technical difficulties Channel 7 would have faced hooking up coverage from the Peruvian town of Iquitos.)
But the All Stars’ gloomy record is taking its toll of the national soccer federation (FEDFUT) in the form of growing fan nervousness as the World Cup eliminations approach. Even FEDEFUT director Carlos Quesada admitted, “I’m worried, especially since I heard Medford promise we’d see ‘a different team,’ but however different it might be, it still didn’t win or even tie…”
Although the World Cup is not until 2010 in South Africa, FEDEFUT realizes that one does not build a champion soccer machine overnight. It was not until 1990 that this country made it past the eliminations and that team did the best of all, making it to the second round. Medford himself has made the bench a musical chairs game as he experiments with a variety of player combinations. Nothing has worked so far.
With only three months remaining before the first World Cup elimination match, fans have a right to be upset. To rub salt in the wound of the Sele’s last defeat, Peru’s coach salted his side with novices taken from that country’s minor soccer leagues!