The current champs got a new coach in Gorosito and signed a few new players to add some power to a pretty strong squad. They lost in la Recopa to Olimpia and know that this is their only chance more than likely to participate in an international competition
Top players and newcomers: Alberto Acosta, Leandro Romagnoli, Ariel Carreño, Patricio Ormazabal, Claudio Morel Rodriguez, Diego Saja, S. Gonzalez
Bolivar
The most popular team in Bolivia is once again ready to push for the title in this edition of the Sudamericana. They have a very strong team from keeper to strikers. They are certaily contenders, but they may have have to try to get past San Lorenzo who eliminated them in a thrilling semifinal last year.
Top players and newcomers: Jose Carlo Fernandez, Marco Sandy, Luis Gatty Ribeiro, Limberg Gutierrez, Joaquin Botero
The Strongest
The current Bolivian champions have been the more consistent team in Bolivia. They have some excellent forwards who can make the difference at any given moment.
Top players and newcomers: Luis Cristaldo, Alex de Rosa, Dario Gigena, Christian Alfaro
Monagas
The from Maturin will make it's play it's 2nd Copa Sudamericana in a row. Not expecting much out of this team.
Deportivo Italchacao
One of the most traditional teams in Venezuela, will try to make it out of this very difficult group.
Monagas vs Italchacao in Maturin, Venezuela. 07/31/03 - 5:00PM (local time)
Monagas has a strong line of Argentinian and Paraguayan players while Italchacao only has local players. Top players in each team are Cristian Casseres and Daniel Noriega for Italchacao both are members of the Venezuelan NT. While for the team from Maturin Hugo Lusardi, Ramon Ojeda and Hector Blanco are their top players.
Bolivar and The Strongest tied 1-1 in a very crappy game. Since the global score was 3-3, they went to PKs. The team "tigre" won the shootout when their GK scored on the 7th round of Pks.
Now The Strongest await the winner of the San Lorenzo vs Italchacao, which is being decided today. San Lorenzo is leading the 2-1 and today's game is at the Nuevo Gasometro in Buenos Aires, so I will venture to say that San Lorenzo will face the Bolivians.
Possible line ups for today's game
SAN LORENZO: Agustín Orión; Pablo Zabaleta, Gonzalo Rodríguez, Claudio Morel Rodríguez, Aldo Paredes, Pablo Zabaleta, Jonathan Santana, Patricio Ormazábal, Damián Luna, Ariel Carreño y Carlos Cordone.
Coach: Néstor Gorosito.
ITALCHACAO: Renny Vega; Rubén Yori, Marcos Ferreira, Wilfredo Alvarado, Daniel Diez, Vicente Suanno, Leopoldo Jiménez, Guillermo Beraza, Javier Campos, Cristián Casseres y Daniel Noriega.
The Strongest advanced to the quarters despite losing to current champs San Lorenzo 2-1. They won the aggregate score 3-2.
This was one of the "funniest" games I have ever seen.
First, San Lorenzo's first goal was ridiculous a cross that the keeper let bounce over his head and Beto Acosta just ran down the ball to tuck it in to the back of the net.
I just nodded my head after that stupid goal.
But the second goal was even worse, but before that The Strongest forward Gigena got himself ejected in the most incredible fashion I remember seeing. He was on his way out of the field being substituted when he got a second yellow card for delaying the game and so being ejected with his replacement waiting on the sidelines. The face of the guy who was supposed to come in was simply hilarious. I couldn't stop laughing for a couple of minutes.:dielaugh:
But then I found myself laughing out loud again when the defender for The Strongest scored an own goal with a "great" header anticipating the keeper on a harmless cross. Simply priceless the expresion of the keeper and the other defenders. Truly a "Kodak moment".
I was just starting to breath again after laughing so hard in the second goal. When I was rolling on the floor again after the most ridiculous PK was called. The San Lorenzo defender literally kick the striker's face. It looked more like a commercial for Tarantino's new film Kill Bill than a football tackle.
To wrap it all up San Lorenzo's keeper got himself ejected after taking down The Strongest's striker outside the box in a last ditch attempt to not allowed them to score a 2nd goal that would end the match. So then we had a field player on goal for San Lorenzo.
Unfortunately there was only 1 minute left in the game, otherwise I would have kept laughing all the way to the quarterfinals.
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