Many lessons should be learned from the Máyer Candelo case. Many. Because from the beginning everything was wrong. And it ended badly. The idol who arrived in the midst of veneration at the beginning of the tournament left in the midst of boos, ruthless criticism and even aggression, which should never have happened.
Candelo did not arrive at the Cali bench for good. He arrived because the managers considered him to be an ideal jumpstart for the team to replace Dudamel, thanks to his love of green, his past and his titles as a player, and his low cost compared to higher caliber coaches. It was, then, a shot in the air, because in his short career as a coach he has not achieved any. The bet had all the risks and failure was more likely than victory, especially with a list that lost almost all its starters in just six months after being champion: De Amores, Angulo, Menosse, Marsiglia, Andrade, Valencia, Colorado, Vasquez and Preciado.
It is paradoxical: Cali did not enjoy the December 2021 title, but suffered from it. Because when the team was expected to be reinforced for the Copa Libertadores, what it did was fall apart. The directors, in their eagerness to alleviate the financial crisis in which the institution is plunged, released players and their replacements were not even the shadow of those who left. The game idea that Dudamel was able to build when he came to save the ship in September of last year was thrown away and it was intended that with an almost new starting roster the team would repeat the feat of the end of the year. And after the Venezuelan’s departure, they left such a responsibility to an anxious Máyer, driven by his wishes, but inexperienced in practice and managing the egos of players like Teófilo, with whom he had serious problems.
But the distances were not only in the dressing room. The executive committee also had fissures, and tired of fighting, Marco Caicedo abandoned ship. Then Luis Fernando Mena wanted to do it, already as president, and they stopped him. Or he stopped. But Gabriel Robayo did not hesitate and he also left his chair empty. If on the field Máyer and his players attacked football due to their low level, in the institutional setting the directors themselves did it, naturally pushed by their inexperience, because there has always been a desire to do things well, but the team’s problems have been clearly above capabilities. In the administrative area there were also desertions and the ship is more alone every day, as if in an inexorable plan of sinking.
What is next for a team that was once an institutional model and now navigates without a route in a financial, administrative, managerial and sports storm? The America was shipwrecked in those same waters until it fell to B. And an investor had to arrive, a Tulio Gómez who was wrong and right many times, but in the end he triumphed and was able to get the ‘Devil’ out of hell itself.
That same lifeline needs the Cali. There is no other formula to get your head out of the bottom and return to shore. There is talk of a foreign investor who makes various demands that Cali cannot meet. There is also talk of the union of partners and fans who could put up capital. It talks and talks. But what the institution urgently needs are facts that allow it to really see the light at the end of the tunnel.
There are many lessons to learn. When a team wins, the next step is to win again, not to tear down the structure that raised it to success. An idol is not properly a messiah in the bank. Five managers cannot speak separately on five radio microphones every day and show their disagreements. The club environment cannot be permeated by football merchants. The hiring of players must respond to a serious project, not to circumstances of desperation and improvisation. And when the rope is pulled to opposite sides due to egos and stubbornness, it will most likely snap until it is impossible to push.
Humility, cool head, union and money. Easy to write, complex to achieve. But if you don’t turn the page once and for all and act intelligently, Cali’s history could be shortened. And nobody wants that.
