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SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador — No one is kidding themselves about what a long shot it is for the scrappy soccer team from this tiny Central American country to qualify for the World Cup tournament in Qatar this year. But hey, one can hope.
Wednesday night's game in San Salvador, pitting La Selecta, as the men's national soccer team is known, against Canada is a make-or-break match.
"We are chasing the fourth-place spot," El Salvador's new head coach, Hugo Pérez, tells NPR in an interview at the soccer league's federation headquarters. "We can't afford to lose another game or mathematically we are out."
On Wednesday, there were sudden doubts about whether the game would happen. El Salvador players reportedly staged a short-lived protest over pay and resources — threatening to refuse to play. But later in the day, players and soccer league officials said the game against Canada was still on.
It's an important match for the two squads. The top three teams, out of eight battling in this part of the world for a trip to Qatar, qualify automatically. The fourth-place team must compete later for a wild-card spot.
El Salvador is banking on a new crop of U.S. players, and coaches, as the key to securing a chance on international soccer's top tournament.
The Salvadoran American head coach helped convince players to come
"I was born here ... I wanted to see if we could help and make some change," says Pérez. The 58-year-old moved to the United States when he was a kid, and went on to play on the U.S. 1984 Olympic and 1994 World Cup teams. He moved back to El Salvador to become head coach last spring. His son, also American, is his assistant coach.
Pérez has convinced more than a dozen American players to join him as well. All were either born in El Salvador but left as small children, or have at least one Salvadoran parent.
New team captain Alex Roldan was born in the U.S. and plays for Major League Soccer's Seattle Sounders. After not being called up for the U.S. men's national team, he says, he decided to play for El Salvador and get a chance to go to the World Cup.
His mother is from El Salvador and his dad from Guatemala. Both Central American national teams recruited him. "I was going to choose one or the other and one parent was going to be happy and the other disappointed," he says, jokingly. "But no, no, both are proud of me and as far as I've come."
She never thought she'd go back to El Salvador to see her sons play
Proud is an understatement, says Ana Roldan, Alex's mother, in a phone interview from the family's home in Los Angeles. "I'm so proud, it's my country," she says.
She left El Salvador in 1982, during the country's civil war. She is now a U.S. citizen. All three of her children grew up playing soccer in Los Angeles and now work in the MLS. The eldest, Cesar, is a trainer for the LA Galaxy. And middle son Cristian, who like Alex plays for the Seattle Sounders, has a spot on the U.S. men's national team.
"I never thought I would go back [to El Salvador] and go to the [Cuscatlán] stadium and see my sons play," she says. Both Alex and Cristian Roldan got minutes on the field in last September's matchup between the U.S. and El Salvador, that ended a 0-0 tie.
The Roldan brothers grew up speaking Spanish and frequently visited El Salvador.
He learned the national anthem on YouTube before coming
Another player on the national team, Walmer Martínez, 23, says speaking Spanish fluently helps him too in El Salvador. He got his Salvadoran passport last summer and quickly joined the national team. His mother is Salvadoran. Martínez, just signed with the United Soccer League's Monterey Bay, California team.
"I didn't know the national anthem though before coming here," he says. But he learned it quickly via YouTube, he says, laughing.
While it's not a new thing for international athletes to switch national allegiances, especially during the Olympics, accepting players not born and raised here in El Salvador had previously been a tough sell.
Head Coach Pérez should know. Back when he was a rising young soccer star in the U.S., he tried to get El Salvador's national team to take him, but was told no.
What a difference a few decades make. "It used to be more serious about that, but not anymore. Whoever wants you and offers you a better program, you go," he says.
The coach helped U.S. soccer become more diverse
And no one has a better eye for young soccer talent than Pérez, says Mike Woitalla, executive editor at the sports news website Soccer America. Pérez — a U.S. National Soccer Hall of Famer — coached U.S. national youth teams for several years, and Woitalla says he was a big force in integrating soccer in the United States.
"It took a long time for U.S. soccer coaches, who come from a northern European background historically, to respect and pay attention to how much talent there is in the Latino community. Hugo Pérez has been aware of that for his whole life, and now he is doing that for El Salvador," Woitalla says.
Fans in El Salvador are grateful for Pérez's influence and the influx of American talent.
"We need these elite players," says fan Yovani Martínez, watching at a San Salvador sports bar as the U.S. beat El Salvador 1-0 last week. "El Salvador deserves this support ... so we can go far in the future." It's been 40 years since El Salvador qualified for the World Cup.
Pérez says the Salvadoran team has come very far in a short time and he has set his sights beyond this year's World Cup qualifiers. His contract goes through 2025.
Midfielder and Salvadoran team Captain, Alex Roldan, is looking toward the future, too. "Being a smaller country, it is difficult to turn the tables overnight. We are slowly getting to where we want to be," he says. "Soon we'll be chasing down those bigger countries."
The match between El Salvador and Canada — barring any further protests — begins at 9 p.m. EST on Wednesday.
A shorter preview of this story appeared on the Morning Edition live blog.
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Transcript :
TAMARA KEITH, HOST:
It's a big soccer night in El Salvador, where the national team faces Canada and fights to stay alive for the World Cup tournament in November. It's a long shot for the tiny country, but its fans are fired up, in part because the team has attracted several American players with Salvadoran roots to join the effort. NPR's Carrie Kahn reports from the capital, San Salvador.
CARRIE KAHN, BYLINE: Dressed in their royal blue uniforms, the Salvadoran team runs drills on the field of the country's storied Cuscatlan Stadium.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken).
KAHN: As dusk falls, small bats flutter about. The team, known as La Selecta, is at near-bottom of the regional World Cup qualifying round. Fans still have hope, but head coach Hugo Perez says tonight is a make-or-break match.
HUGO PEREZ: We're chasing the fourth place, basically, so we cannot afford to lose another game because we're probably mathematically out.
KAHN: Before taking the job last year, Perez says he knew getting the team to Qatar this year would be a long shot for a small country with very few resources.
PEREZ: I'm Salvadorian, so I wanted to see if we could help and make a change.
KAHN: But he says in his long soccer career, he's always taken chances. Perez moved to the U.S. when he was just 11 and rose up the ranks of professional play. He made both the U.S. 1984 Olympics and 1994 World Cup teams, and he is a U.S. Hall of Famer.
He's already convinced more than a dozen Salvadoran Americans with at least one parent from El Salvador to come here too. Major League Soccer Seattle Sounders' midfielder, Alex Roldan, whose mom is Salvadoran, made the move. Roldan said he had a choice between going to El Salvador or Guatemala. His father is Guatemalan. Both teams recruited him.
ALEX ROLDAN: I was going to choose one or the other. And one parent was going to be happy, and one was going to be a little bit disappointed.
KAHN: He's just kidding. But in the end, Mom's home country won out. It had a better chance of qualifying for the World Cup, says Roldan.
ALEX ROLDAN: No. They're both proud of me for how far I've come.
KAHN: Mother Ana Roldan is super-proud of all her kids, she says. She left El Salvador in 1982 during the civil war and lives in Los Angeles. Her middle son, Cristian Roldan, got a slot on the U.S. national team. Last September, when the U.S. played El Salvador here in a qualifying game, she was in the stands beaming.
ANA ROLDAN: (Speaking Spanish).
KAHN: "I never in my life thought I would go back and go to the stadium to watch my sons, both my sons, play," she says.
Both her sons grew up speaking Spanish and visited El Salvador frequently as kids. Alex says that made his transition here not so difficult. Santa Cruz, Calif., native and United Soccer League player Walmer Martinez, whose mom is also Salvadoran, says he's fitting in pretty well, too.
(SOUNDBITE OF PINGPONG BALL BOUNCING)
KAHN: He and some of the other Americans on the team joke around in English while playing Ping-Pong in their San Salvador hotel. Martinez says his Spanish is good, but he didn't know the words to the Salvadoran national anthem.
WALMER MARTINEZ: I didn't, but then I learned it. Yeah.
KAHN: How did you learn it?
W MARTINEZ: YouTube. YouTube (laughter). YouTube.
KAHN: Fans in El Salvador are glad their team is bringing talent back home.
(CHEERING)
KAHN: Last week at a packed sports bar, the crowd is glued to huge screens as the Salvadoran team kept the U.S. scoreless for a full half. The loss, ultimately 1-0, was respectable thanks to the dual nationals, says fan Yovani Martinez.
YOVANI MARTINEZ: (Speaking Spanish).
KAHN: "Look; we have these elite players now that have come up through the ranks," he says. "They're helping elevate the whole team's level of play," says Martinez. He knows chances of going to the World Cup this year are slim, but he's excited about their prospects in 2026.
Head coach Perez hopes others here at home also have patience. The team just signed up eight new sponsors. Before Perez came here, it had only one.
PEREZ: It's a good challenge because, basically, we're building the program from the bottom.
KAHN: Players today staged a short-lived protest over pay promises and resources. Alex Roldan, now captain, told me earlier that he's in it for the long run.
ALEX ROLDAN: Being a smaller country, it's definitely really difficult to turn the tables overnight, but we're slowly getting to where we want to be.
KAHN: And, hey, he says, we'll be chasing some of those bigger countries soon.
Carrie Kahn, NPR News, San Salvador. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.