Oceano da Cruz talks about Colombian soccer after his time as Queiroz’s assistant – International Soccer – Sports

Ocean da Cruz recalled his time in Colombia, after having been an assistant to Carlos Queiroz in the Colombian national team.

Oceano, a coach born in Cape Verde and a Portuguese national, participated in the A Sports Tailors Podcast, in which he was consulted by Colombian soccer, whom he knew well from his work with Queiroz.

Ocean over Colombia

Oceano was asked if he was delighted or disappointed by Colombia, to which he said: “I have charm for Colombia!”.

The next query was if he would train in Colombia, to which he commented. “Yes, because Colombia has something fantastic, its players were born to play soccer. They lack one thing that Europe has: training for these players. Here, in almost all countries, the players start a very strong training from an early age “This is not the case in Colombia. There is no organized championship for the training of players. The players have extraordinary talent, but they lack a bit of preparation,” said Oceano.

Oceano added: “What appeals to me about Colombia is that, even knowing that there is this gap in training, if you bring the players to a slightly younger age, you manage to give them the training they lacked. Because the rest have it all. Some clubs are already starting to work, Atletico Nacional, Junior Barranquilla, Chicó (which this year surprised everyone in the training), they are already beginning to have training work, but that work takes years to bear fruit”.

Since 2014 Oceano has been Carlos Queiroz’s assistant, first in the Iran team and then in the Colombia team, where the process was cut off during the Qatar 2022 qualifying round.

Oceano took stock of his time with the National Team, he recalled the 2019 Copa América, “not as well as we wanted.”

SPORTS

More sports news