River Plate will officially start the post-Marcelo Gallardo era, led by another son of the house like Martín Demichelis, when they visit Central Córdoba de Santiago del Estero this Saturday, in one of the most relevant matches of the first date of the Professional Soccer League (LPF).
The match will take place from 9:30 p.m. at the Único Madre de Ciudades Stadium, which will be full and with the presence of 8,000 “neutrals”, a euphemism to define River fans. Facundo Tello will be the referee, Darío Herrera will be in charge of VAR and the transmission will be from TNT Sports.
The time for the official debut of Demichelis arrived, the friendlies were held against La Calera from Chile (0-0) in San Luis, Monterrey from Mexico (1-0), Millonarios from Colombia (2-0) and Vasco da Gama from Brazil ( 3-0), in the United States, and Racing from Uruguay (3-1), at River Camp.
It is not an easy task for the former defender and coach of the German Bayer Munich youth team, it is always a company of enormous importance to be the manager of a giant like River, but even more so at this juncture, replacing Gallardo, the most winning coach in history. “millionaire”.
Demichelis, 42, arrives with his imprint and managing the most important team in terms of quality and quantity of the LPF. He appears as a demanding coach who will not relinquish leadership with his team, with firmness and discipline, leaving a little aside the neat start from the bottom as a trademark.
This River will not bet so much on having possession of the ball, Demichelis’s idea is to accentuate a total verticality and quick transitions, differences that could be obvious with respect to what was done by Gallardo’s River, more fond of the “elaboration” of match.
The “millionaire” squad was joined by Matías Kranevitter (he suffered a serious injury against La Calera and is still not recovered), the return from Brazil of Nacho Fernández, Enzo Díaz de Talleres and the Venezuelan Salomón Rondón is expected to arrive next week. who comes from English Everton.
River is going for everything, it has a 2023 with LPF, Copa Argentina and Copa Libertadores and next February 22 it will face Banfield in a semifinal of the 2020 Champions Trophy to define that trophy against Boca on March 1.
In Central Córdoba there will also be a debut on the substitute bench and it will be that of coach Leonardo Madelón, who replaced Abel Balbo, today the coach of Estudiantes de La Plata.
The “Railway” has a very clear objective and is to add points to swell the average in the table that will define the descents. Start the season with 1,164 and surpass Sarmiento, Platense and Arsenal and it depends on what happens with the promoted Cordoba, Belgrano and Instituto.
Central Córdoba will face the LPF with a practically new squad, of which only a few footballers bet to stay and try to continue in the club.
A figure with great experience such as Luis Miguel Rodríguez (former Atléico Tucumán and Colón, bought from Colón) arrived at the club, he would not be a starter, and there are almost 20 players, the most prominent being Lucas Gamba (former Rosario Central and Huracán) and Ciro Rius (former Atlético Tucumán).
In history they played four times and River won all of them: two of them in Nuñez and two in Santiago.
Probable formations
Central Cordoba (Santiago del Estero): Marcos Ledesma; Julián Navas, Fabio Pereyra, Gustavo Canto and Marcelo Benítez; Ciro Rius, Jesús Soraire, Enzo Kalinski and Leandro Ciccolini; Lucas Gamba and Facundo Castelli. DT: Leonardo Madelon.
River Plate: Franco Armani; Robert Rojas, Emanuel Mammana, Jonatan Maidana and Milton Casco; Enzo Pérez, Rodrigo Aliendro, Nacho Fernández and José Paradela; Pablo Solari and Miguel Borja. DT: Martin Demichelis.
Referee: Facundo Tello
Stadium: Unique Mother of Cities
Hours: 9:30 p.m.
TV: TNT Sports.
