The humiliating defeat against Deportivo Riestra generated a wave of harsh criticism and crude analysis about the present of River, and fundamentally their future in the Copa Libertadores, the great objective of the year. With the players already licensed until the preseason, Martin Demichelis and leaders are doing a review behind closed doors to face the 2024 transfer market. But behind closed doors too, and the one who joined the wave was Oscar Ruggeri.
The world champion with the Greatest in 1986, who currently works as a panelist for ESPN, made a detailed list of errors, shortcomings and aspects to improve that River has, and even revealed details of a talk he had with Jorge Brito. But he also left a strong opinion: “This is how you can’t win the Copa Libertadores“.
What Ruggeri said about River’s present and what he needs to be champion
First of all, Cabezón agreed with a reading that almost everyone in the River world has, at least outside the club, and that is that duels, especially as visitors, cost him horrors. “There are games in which you know you can’t play and you have to score, hit sticks. The boys play well, but they lack grit”Ruggeri said.
Along the same lines, he assured: “River lacks players of character and thus you cannot win the Libertadoreshe’s missing three bad ones“. The former defender made the well-worn comparison with Boca and considered the incorporation of Gary Medel a success, to whom he highlighted the characteristics that, according to him, Demichelis’ team lacks.
Ruggeri’s talk with Jorge Brito: what he said to the president of River
“I told him: ‘play it’. They are going to get 40 million for the Club World Cup, and it is not easy to bring these guys (in reference to Adam Bareiro, Jeremías Ledesma and Germán Pezzella), but you have to put up the money. It’s not to disparage the players, but they don’t have that thing that grabs you on the field with three or four guys shouting and ordering.“, revealed.
At the same time, Ruggeri recommended Enzo Francescoli that “go to Portugal, sit in front of Otamendi and have Nico tell him to his face: ‘I don’t want to go to River’, because it’s fucking bad to tell him no, to go and take advantage of who he is.” The Benfica defender is a self-confessed Millonario fan and flirted with his return, but finally renewed with the Eagles.
Refering to continuity of Martín DemichelisCabezón did not express an opinion but he did highlighted that “the leadership is happy“ with Micho and did not separate the footballers from the present evil, alleging specific errors that do not depend on the coach: “It’s okay to be angry. I know him, he was a defender and he has that, but who is he going to get angry with? The penalty came from the side…”.
