Atlético Bucaramanga finished as leader of the BetPlay League.
Photo: @ABucaramanga
One of the historic teams that have not yet been able to get a star starts, with justice from today, at the start of the home runs as favorite to fight for the first title of the year: the Atlético Bucaramanga of my loves. Many will find it difficult to give that label to the leopard due to the lack of habit of seeing it in these instances, installed in the semifinals with five dates in advance and with the invisible point in their pocket, after finishing first in the All against All with a difference of goal of 14, product of 24 goals for and just 10 against. In addition, playing well, with balance in his lines, defending efficiently and with his practical and accurate style to hurt the opponent when he needs it, without despairing.
After a long time, the managers decided to start doing things better and took the first step by hiring Rafael Dudamel, the Venezuelan coach who already knew how to win the local league with Cali, has had many more successes than mistakes and has achieved a very united and committed team.
He does not have figures, but he does have references who suddenly, like himself, had a desire for revenge for their current situation, which was not ideal, such as Fabián Sambueza, Aldair Quintana, Freddy Hinestroza, Aldair Gutiérrez and Fabry Castro, to name a few. Around them, several utility players with a good average age and adequate physique for the style of play they propose.
The reissue of Jefferson Mena and Carlos Henao, who lead a modern defensive apparatus that is complemented by the third (three centre-backs play in the background), which adapts to the characteristics of the rival on duty and combines its movements very well with Castro, Flórez and Gutiérrez, who cannot be left out of the team’s best defensive system in years. Forward he is fast and accurate, he smells the blood of his prey and finishes with the deep wingers Micolta and Córdoba to finish with Mosquera or Martínez if appropriate on the inside.
The city is rightly excited and excited because it believes that, after 75 years of frustration, it now deserves the rewards of victory. And far from speculations or tendencies about the outcome of this otherwise capricious Colombian system, there are arguments. Of course the shelf can fall, due to the shield’s own inexperience, but it is also time for the best in the tournament to win and not just the one who made the lazy student who in the end got his act together and saved his graduation party.
In 1997 they invented a long tournament and owed the Olympic return to those then directed by Carlos Mario Hoyos; teams like 1960, or 84, 90 or 2106 were very close to glory, but this time there is an important conviction and an overflowing expectation in the people of Santander who promise, as the anthem composed by Pablo Rueda Arciniegas says, one one of the most beautiful in this country, going “always forward, not a step back.”
