Colombia’s national soccer team looks to advance to second place in the South American group World Cup qualifiers when they take on Bolivia Friday, March 22.
The Colombian selection will face off against seventh-ranked Bolivia at home in the northern city of Barranquilla on Friday. In anticipation for the match, Colombia’s star striker Radamel Falcao tweeted, “Good day!!! Barranquilla we have a great atmosphere to eliminate [Bolivia], and surely [sic] on Friday the city will be totally yellow.”
Buenos días !!! en Barranquilla ya tenemos un gran ambiente de Eliminatoria,y seguranente que el viernes el metro sera totalmente amarillo
— Radamel Falcao (@FALCAO) March 20, 2013
Colombia sits in third place among South America teams with 16 points, just one point behind Ecuador who has already played one more game than Colombia. If they can defeat Bolivia, a team barely hanging on to qualifying contention with only two wins and eight points, they will move ahead of Ecuador which has a bye week.
Bolivia’s defense strategy for Friday’s match intends to limit the effectiveness of strikers Radamel Falcao and Jackson Martinez, the back bones of Colombia’s offensive attack.
Edward Zenteno, one of the starting defenseman against Colombia told Prensa Latina, “We’ll have a lot of work in the backfield, knowing that Colombia today has important players that today are doing well in their club teams, and in the highly competitive leagues.”
Colombia s team is also developing a strategy under the Argentine head coach Jose Pekerman, who has reportedly tested several offensive strategies that will involve several players.
According to Colombia’s goalkeeper David Ospina, “We are now only thinking about Bolivia. It’s a team that has very strong players up front and with a lot of depth. It’s going to be a complicated match-up but we’re going to put our skills on the field.”
The team made it clear that they are looking for the three points with a win against Bolivia before they take on fourth place Venezuela on March 26. Venezuela currently sits fourth behind Colombia with 12 points. Venezuela will face top-ranked Argentina (20 points) on Friday.
Colombians have not watched their team play in a World Cup since 1998 and have only seen their team advance to the second round in the Cup once.
Colombian soccer hero Carlos “El Pibe” Valderrama, said last month that the current Colombian selection would have the edge over his 1994 team because of the amount of players they have playing in more competitive, foreign leagues.
MORE: Current World Cup Team has edge over ours: Carlos ‘El Pibe’ Valderrama
Sources
- Equipo boliviano alista viaje a Colombia preocupada por ataque rival (Prensa Latina)
- South America World Cup (FIFA)
- Colombia cocina estrategia para vencer a Bolivia (La Nacion)
- Radamel Falcao (Twitter)
