The Life of Edinson Cavani: Football and Field

Football and field, this is how the life of Edinson Cavani could be summed up

The signing of Edinson Cavani to Boca Juniors could easily be considered among the Guinness Records as one of the longest in the history of football. Not because of the deal that began in the current pass market and took several weeks to be defined, but because since 2020 there have been strong rumors of his possible landing in La Ribera, more precisely since the assumption of Juan Román Riquelme in the blue and gold leadership. Both maintained fluid contact from a distance and never stopped encouraging their mutual appreciation. But there was even a chapter before this story, when the Matador had not yet turned 20 and was about to sign at Xeneize.

Just as Lionel Messi never changed his Rosario dialectic, customs and visits to his hometown, the case of Cavani’s roots is similar. There is a difference between them when it comes to referring to football: Leo calls him “football”, Edinson -if he doesn’t have a camera and recorder nearby- tells him “football”. Originally from Salto, a city located 500 kilometers from Montevideo and separated from Argentina (Concordia) by the Uruguay River, Edi grew up with his parents and older brothers in the countryside, among pastures, horses and always, but always with a soccer ball nearby. . Because both her father Luis hers, known among her countrymen as the Gringo, and her older brother, Walter Guglielmone (with whom she shares a mother), made her suck on her favorite sport since her childhood.

Guglielmone, who goes by Fernando because it is his other first name, is nine years older and was a professional soccer player. He served as a striker for Nacional, Peñarol, Ajaccio of France, Pachuca of Mexico and Uruguay in the 2001 Copa América, among others. He was the beacon for Edinson, he was the one he looked to and he had as his closest reference point when he joined the ranks of the Danube juniors. His other brother, Christian, grew up alongside him (he is one year older) and also tried his hand at soccer as a central defender, although he did not go beyond the amateur level. In the Cavani house there were no luxuries and nothing was left over, but the Copa Libertadores battles were followed on television at any cost. Edinson’s passion for the ball increased just in the golden age of Carlos Bianchi’s Boca in the late 90s and early 2000s.

Cavani was captain of the Uruguayan Under 20 team in the South American and World Cup in 2007 (AFP/Juan MABROMATA)

Which team is Edinson Cavani a fan of? The mystery has not yet been fully revealed. There are several versions: that as a boy he encouraged Nacional to go against his father and his older brother, fans of Peñarol, and that he finally ended up becoming Manya by family mandate. El Cebolla Rodríguez, some time ago, asserted that if Cavani returned to Uruguayan football, he would do so at Carbonero. But the current president of the Bag publicly acknowledged that he is a tricolor fan and that he would choose to wear the shirt that Luis Suárez recently wore if he returned to his payments.

His brother Christian added questions to the matter in an interview with DSports Radio: “Most of us are from Peñarol, but Edi I don’t know. It was never known what team he was from. If I knew, I’ll tell you. At the beginning, as a boy, from Nacional. But I never saw that fanaticism towards Nacional. He used to say that as a boy. We, always from Peñarol”.

Due to closeness, quality, identification with customs and passion, the Cavanis followed both Argentine and Uruguayan football. They could even become more aware of the fate of the teams from the other side of the pond than of the nationals. And logically the desire was to one day make the leap to Europe and wear the jersey of his national team. With his eyes on the Old Continent, an idolatry was forged by an Argentine center forward who also broke nets with the Albiceleste: Gabriel Omar Batistuta. “At some point I dreamed that I was Batistuta in the field. I am far away in sports, but close in passion for what was ours, which was, is and will be football ”, is a message that Cavani displays on his Instagram account, with a split photo of him next to the Batigol.

Edinson, along with his brother Christian and his father, Gringo Luis

At just 18 years old, he made his professional debut in the First Danube and became local champion in the 2006/2007 season, in which he exploded. He was captain of the Uruguayan Under 20 team that got a ticket to the World Cup in the category in Paraguay, in the South American competition in which Argentina won 1-0 in injury time with a goal from Lautaro Acosta and removed Celeste’s chance to witness the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. In the Mundialito he used the bracelet again and formed an attacking duo with Luis Suárez: he scored two goals in four duels and was eliminated after extra time in the round of 16 at the hands of the United States.

A few months before, the chance to sign in Boca had been latent. With the boom in the South American, Cavani captivated several European emissaries and at Xeneize they valued him as a good bet for the future. But Miguel Ángel Russo had in his squad a current Martín Palermo, Rodrigo Palacio, Bruno Marioni and a young Mauro Boselli on offense. The chronicles of the time state that Pedro Pompilio had approached Danubio with an offer of $1,200,000 for 50% of the pass, but the Uruguayan club would finally make the most important sale in its history with Palermo of Italy, which disbursed more than 4 million euros for the entirety of his record. From that moment, Cavani has the thorn of not having put on the Boquense shirt.

From then on, his career was pure vertigo: he appeared in the Sicilian team, jumped to Napoli, cycle of seven seasons in a PSG full of stars, two more years in Manchester United and his last spell in Valencia of Spain. In parallel, he scored five goals in the four World Cups he played (South Africa 2010, Brazil 2014, Russia 2018 and Qatar 2022), won a title with Uruguay (Copa América 2011) and became the Uruguayan player with the most trophies in the story at all levels: 25 in total. All the cups he kissed, with the exception of the first with Danubio, the only one he won with the Uruguayan team and an Italia Cup in Naples, were with the Parisian entity.

The Uruguayan is a fervent lover of nature and enjoys it 100% in his native Salto

Apart from throwing walls with stars like Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Neymar, Cavani made friends with several Argentines such as Javier Pastore, Ángel Di María, Ezequiel Lavezzi, Mauro Icardi and Giovani Lo Celso. The rounds of mate were present at each concentration, as well as the roasts with a French touch. And although he began to indulge in some European luxuries, he did not lose his tradition of wearing country panties, espadrilles and a beret in private. That was the uniform on every excursion through his native Salto when the recess of the seasons allowed him to visit his family. Edi never traded comfort in clothing for the lavishness of Louis Vuitton, Gucci or Dolce Gabbana.

His children Bautista and Lucas, fruits of the relationship with his first wife, María Soledad Cabris Yarrús, inherited his devotion to soccer and country customs. And surely the same thing happens with India and Silvestre, offspring that he shares with his current partner Jocelyn Burgardt, who have already put on the Valencia shirt and are enjoying horseback riding with his father. In Salto there is never a lack of horseback riding, fishing, hunting with his father Luis and even a game of bowls. Nor the baths in the rivers and nearby hot springs. The mates, roasts and stoves are almost religious matters for Cavani when he returns home to his hometown. And he even has been shown harvesting and cutting the grass with a sickle as if he were a farmhand. Not for nothing does he celebrate his goals by pretending that he shoots an arrow from a bow with one knee on the ground.

“I want to be like “Manteca” Martínez, hang on to the fabric. It is part of football and the little field that we have in South America”, was the phrase with which the Boca fan was excited for the first time in 2019. With Copas Américas, the World Cup and a current contract in Europe, the phrase sounded more like a dream for the future than to reality. But he slowly began to feed and even more so when Riquelme confided that he was holding talks and there was a concrete possibility of adding him to Boca at some point.

In the final stretch of his professional career, Cavani had the dream of playing for a while with the Boca shirt. Neither the millions of Europe nor the Middle East mobilized him to deprive himself of that longing that he had as a boy and shared with his family. The need to be close to his people convinced him to pack his bags and break the contract in Valencia, despite the fact that he had one more year signed to play in the Spanish league. From now on Edinson will no longer shoot arrows with an imaginary bow, from now on he will climb the fence to celebrate his goals in front of the Boca fans.

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2023-07-31 04:16:02
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