ISP Exclusive - LG Cup Preview: Paraguay

If any team in the world can teach Italians a lesson in defensive football and Catenaccio, it's Paraguay. Specially at home in Asuncion their defense is hard to beat and in the last two World Cups they gave a hard time to both France and Germany, the eventual winners and finalists of 98 and 2002, in the 2nd round because of their great defense, fantastic behaviour in duels and the way they gave no space to the opponent.
It's said that Paraguay's football stuck itself in the early 70ies and didn't progress any further. However, you can't qualify for the third time in a row if you play old school football. It's rather that Paraguay has found an own way to play football, which has a lot of reminiscence of the old days of Catenaccio, played by Italian teams of the late 60's and early 70's. No wonder then that their coach at the last World Cup was Cesare Maldini and Paraguay's football was usually influenced a lot by Italian coaches and Italian football in general.

World Cup Qualification progress

Paraguay finished 4th in the COMNEBOL Qualification tournament with 8 wins, 4 draws and 6 defeats. However, their home record is pretty impressive as they only lost to Columbia in a game that didn't matter to them anymore as they were already qualfied. Neither Argentina nor Brazil managed to score in Asuncion, which should give a view about their strength at home.

Star of the team

Carlos Gamarra

Obviously the two best known players in Europe from Paraguay are Roque Santa Cruz and Nelson Valdez. However, the captain of the team, key figure and leader is centerback Carlos Gamarra from Brazilian club Palmeiras, the most capped player in Paraguay's history. Gamarra used to be considered as one of the finest defenders in South American football and his partnership in defense with Francisco Arce, Celso Ayala and Denis Caniza used to be compared to the famous France back four of 98-2000 with Thuram-Blanc-Desailly-Lizarazu, that didn't lose a single game their whole career, when they played together.
Gamarra is still with 34 the leader of the defense and a strong defender of typical Southern American qualities, which means he is tough in challenges, has great positioning and good skills on the ball. Given his age, the World Cup should be the finishing point of his career.
Unfortunately, Gamarra will not participate in the LG Cup. In his absence, Toledo or Acuna should be his replacements as captain of the team.

Coach and tactics

Paraguay's coach is the Uruguayan Anibal Ruiz, who in 2002 was only believed to be a temporary coach, but after leading the U-23 team under his supervision to the silver medal in the Olympics of 2004, he became the undisputed coach of the team. Their tactics is traditionally defensive. Ruiz once explained that it wouldn't make sense to play offensive football with Paraguay, as Paraguay's football culture is built on defense and it would be unnatural to play different. The team plays a traditional 4-4-2 with two flat lines.

Strenghts/Weaknesses

Obviously their biggest strength is their defense, which is in fact probably unmatched by any other team in South America. Their defensive game plan makes it difficult for every team to score against them and there are few teams harder to beat in defense than them. Their obvious weakness though is their offense and lack of creativity and their problem to win away from home. Their 5 defeats away from home in their WCQ should be a proof of it.

Paraguay's squad for the LG Cup

Derlis Gomez (Sportivo Luqueno), Miguel Cardenas (Nacional); Julio Manzur (Guarani), Pedro Benitez (Cerro Porteno), Angel Martinez (Nacional), Jorge Nunez (Racing, Argentina), Ignacio Paniagua (Tacuary), Hector Sosa (12 de Octubre) and Delio Cesar Toledo (Real Zaragoza); Jose Montiel (Olimpia), Carlos Bonet (Libertad), Luis Nunez (Sportivo Luqueno), Cristian Riveros (Libertad), Roberto Acuna (Deportivo La Coruna), Julio Dos Santos (Cerro Porteno) and Edgar Robles (3 de Febrero); Dante Lopez (Olimpia), Juan Samudio (Libertad), Santiago Salcedo (Tokio FC) and Raul Roman (Tacuary).