SANTIAGO-. Away from the selection of Uruguay for his retirement, the national idol Luis Suarez caused an earthquake in Uruguay after strongly criticizing the national team coach, the Argentinian Marcelo Bielsaand the tense atmosphere in the Celeste locker room due to the friction between the coach and players.
The forward, 37 years old and the national team’s top scorer, detailed in an interview with DSports that the complaints against Bielsa are due to the human side and the treatment provided to the players and officials of the Uruguay Celeste Complex. The statements have caused a stir in the country and uncovered a pressure cooker at the gates of a new double date of the Qualifiers.
The situation has escalated to such a point that several footballers even considered leaving the national team.
“In the Copa América there were teammates who even said ‘Luis, I’m playing in the Copa América and I’m not playing anymore.’ Companions. And you start thinking and say: ‘We are reaching a difficult point,’” he said about the “painful situations” in the continental tournament. The friction, he continued, “will continue to happen and the players will reach a limit where they will explode.”
The Inter Miami forward, who retired from La Celeste a month ago after the match against Paraguay in the South American qualifying round, denounced Bielsa’s alleged orders that the team not stop to talk to fans until the lack of tact with his commanded during the concentrations of the Uruguayan team.
“You see that the players go and they don’t enjoy it. You see that in their teams they have fun, they smile and they don’t do it in the national team, they are not enjoying it. What the national team is experiencing hurts me,” he said.
Among the frictions experienced in the Copa América, the former Barcelona player mentioned a conversation he had with Bielsa to expose the discomfort on the bench, an occasion that he took advantage of to assure the coach that, despite this, the team supported him and respected his decisions. “He didn’t answer me anything after five minutes I spoke. I didn’t get any response. From then on I accepted that I had to stay silent.”
Regarding the harsh treatment with the team during their coexistence in the United States, Suárez revealed that “many players held a meeting to ask the coach to at least say good day to us.” “He didn’t even say hello,” he added.
He also detailed the tension surrounding the situation of Agustín Canobbio, who did not appear again in Uruguay’s squad after expressing his anger in the last Copa América match for feeling “mistreated” by Bielsa. “To a player who is in “You can’t make the 26 called up for a Cup participate as if they were a sparring partner. That bothers me, I understand Agus was quite restrained in this one and it’s normal that he got to that situation,” Suárez evaluated.
He also referred to an altercation between the Argentine coach and forward Darwin Núñez, the target of harsh comments from the coach during the break of a match against Argentina in La Bombonera. “I saw Darwin crying and I told him: ‘You are here because of your merit, for what you work for, you are a scorer and you are the best. That’s why when he scored the goal I was the first one he greeted.”
Later, he revealed that he met Bielsa in the hallway, who supported his decision. “After the win, Bielsa greeted me and said: ‘Do you know what’s happening? If I don’t talk to him like that… You saw what happened in the second half.”
Uruguay’s top scorer also denounced that, at the Uruguay Celeste Complex, workers are not allowed to have contact with the players outside of what their task entails, and assured that the Uruguayan Football Association (AUF) is aware of the discomfort of the footballers.
“It hurts me to say it, but (Ignacio) Alonso (president of the AUF) and (Jorge) Giordano (manager of the National Teams) allowed it. They were the ones who gave him that authority to have that relationship with the staff,” he snapped.
Asked why he decided to talk about all this now, Suárez explained that he had wanted to express himself for a long time but did not find the right moment until he made a decision about his future in the Uruguayan team, since he did not want to be “participant in a problem.” However, Bielsa’s words about him in his last conference, where he praised his qualities and way of playing, have shocked him, since, internally, he never received similar comments or compliments.
