“The one who invests in the field and in the agricultural and livestock activity is because he loves it.
He grew up, he lives and his dream is to retire from football and return to the field ”.
The phrase belongs to a renowned businessman from a soccer family, Ricardo Schliper (h), and summarizes why that sum of soccer plus the field is increasingly profitable.
Former players, coaches, leaders, businessmen, and also active soccer players invest in land, in Argentina, because
it is one of the most profitable assets
despite the stocks, the droughts, the lack of inputs, the obstacles to imports and exports, etc., etc.... They show that they can live from the countryside and its derivatives, from rural work and from their agricultural productions after making the investments with everything obtained by running after a ball around… soccer fields all over the world.
Leo Ponzio
, the "eternal" captain of River, a club in which he played 357 games, scored 10 goals and did 17 Olympic laps, officially said goodbye to football last September.
But he already had his north: nothing less than his field located in the south of the province of Santa Fe, in Las Rosas (his hometown, located 125 km from Rosario).
He always
showed the same passion for the two activities
that he develops in parallel.
This is how he was seen raising glasses like a gaucho, riding a horse, encouraging himself to play the guitar at barbecues with friends, family and the contractors who work in his field.
Ponzio today accompanies the Uruguayan Enzo Francescoli in the Technical Secretariat of River, at the same time that he is one more producer in the core area of Argentina.
And as Schlieper summed up well,
his relationship with the field comes from his origins
.
His paternal grandparents owned fields and his maternal grandparents were laborers on a farm.
Today Ponzio continues the family tradition supported by his father Daniel, although he could not convince his friends Maxi Rodríguez and Nacho Scocco to join “Team Campo”.
"I even told them that I was handling them with my old man," says Ponzio with a fresh smile.
“He always comes to the countryside on vacation and when I had the opportunity to invest, I didn't hesitate.
I played soccer to buy fields.
They tempted me with thousands of investments but I wanted to get into this, in agriculture.
My dad worked in a bank and due to a health problem he had to leave.
Who better than him to advise me, take care of them and manage them!", says Leo, who first dedicated himself to livestock -my grandfather always told me it was the best savings account- and then to agricultural production (sorghum, corn, sunflower ).
Leonardo Ponzio, in his field, very close to his horses.
Credit: Chule Valerga.
“
In the field I am more daring and attacking than in football
or in life itself.
And now, with technology, everything serves to improve ”, he says, getting on one of his two new tractors.
In addition, he has a sprayer and a combine.
In "the sidewalk in front", the Argentine soccer superclassic could not be absent.
Roberto "Pato" Abbondanzieri
saved in Rosario Central, Boca, Getafe (Spain) and Inter de Porto Alegre.
With the Argentine National Team he reached the quarterfinals in Germany 2006 (he left due to injury) and also played in the Copa América in Peru 2004 and Venezuela 2007.
“I left football because I wanted to enjoy my parents (now deceased), but Martín (Palermo) called me to accompany him on his first adventure as DT.
He couldn't tell her no, ”he recalls.
But, also, he bought a combine and sowed wheat and soybeans in his field located in the Santa Fe town of Bouquet, also his hometown that has just 1,500 inhabitants.
Today he gets up at 6.45 and goes to bed after midnight.
Four years ago, when his father Carlos died, he made the decision not to continue playing soccer but to follow the family tradition: "My father worked with a family of contractors and I grew up on top of the combine harvesters."
His youngest son, Felipe (27) helps him with planting and harvesting, but "Pato" is also advised by an agronomist and his brother-in-law Fabián Borri (his sister's husband).
The Abbondanzieri Duck, above the combine. Photo: JUAN JOSE GARCIA.
Far from “the crack”, Abbondanzieri does not side with any political sector, although he is clear that “
the countryside gives a lot but what they take from you in taxes is also bad
.
Argentina could advance if it focuses 100% on the countryside, taking advantage of agriculture and livestock."
Says someone who won 16 titles between national (6) and international (10) in the fields of the world.
The face of Messi and the champion Scaloneta
Almost four months ago, the Argentine soccer team became world champion in Qatar and the albiceleste fever still runs through the country.
Carlos "Charly" Faricelli is a Cordoba farmer who was the first to have the brilliant idea of
planting his corn field in the south of the province with the face of Lionel Messi
.
That move went viral through Twitter and Faricelli explained that "with the technology that the field offers us today, he cannot always design as he wants through digital machines."
Messi's seeded face (Photo by Nicolas AGUILERA / AFP)
But Messi's link with the countryside is not limited to the pitches or the more than 20 producers who honored him through precision agriculture.
In 2015, the newspaper El Territorio, from Corrientes, and other portals in the Mesopotamian province, reported that the world's top soccer star had bought some 6,800 hectares of the Rincón Chico farm in San Carlos (Ituzaingó department) for 20 million dollars. , bordering with Misiones), about 60 km from Posadas.
Specialists explained that this place has potential for cattle ranching, rice cultivation and yerba mate plantations.
But no one from the Messi family confirmed or denied the news.
It is known that the Messi, today, are more focused on the hotel business in various parts of the world.
Some time before, in 2011, the digital site "lapolíticaonline.com" and the newspaper El Litoral had already related Messi to the field by announcing the purchase of some 5,000 hectares in Gualeguaychú (Entre Rios), for around 5 million Dollars.
coach of the Argentine national team Lionel Scaloni with the message "Thank you Lio", in Pujato (Argentina).
EFE/ Franco Trovato Fuoco
In the south of Santa Fe, the town of Pujato gained notoriety when another
Lionel, Scaloni
, his prodigal son, led Argentina to the top of the soccer world.
There still live his parents (Angel and Eulalia) and
his brother Mauro
(also a former footballer) who runs the family fields.
This town of 4,000 inhabitants is located 13 km from Casilda and 40 km from Rosario.
But it has a particularity: it has 400 cargo trucks, that is, one truck for every 10 people.
For this reason, it has been considered since 1994 as "The Transport Capital of the Province". Agricultural exploitation and transport became fundamental pillars for the development of the region.
Union make force
There are many well-known current soccer players and much more those already retired who have their fields in full production, throughout the Argentine territory.
From
Gabriel Omar Batistuta
(with his 126,000-hectare field "El Bati" in Reconquista, Santa Fe province), passing through the current River side,
Enzo "El Gaucho" Díaz
(in Las Toscas, Lincoln district, province of Buenos Aires).
Carlos Alberto Tevez
also
has a ranch 8 kilometers from Maipú.
And Matías Jesús Almeyda owns agricultural ventures in Azul, about which he said: “The money I earned with my legs in soccer I invested in Argentina.
For his part,
Javier Mascherano
(he bought the La María ranch, formerly María Linda), with 441 hectares in the Colegiales area of San Pedro, destined for agricultural-livestock production.
Even
Ramón Angel Díaz
, the consecrated former DT of River and a figure of the National Team, has been dedicating himself for a long time with his sons Emiliano and Michael to renting fields as a hunting ground for wild boar, deer and birds.
The land is located in La Pampa, Entre Ríos and La Rioja.
The list is long and includes
Sergio Angel "La Bruja" Berti
(Villa Constitución, Santa Fe), a skilled millionaire midfielder from the '90s, and
Ezequiel "Equi" González,
Boca's first 10 after the retirement of Juan Román Riquelme. who is dedicated to the business of pigs and afforestation forests in Esquina (Corrientes), the payments of the parents of Diego Maradona.
“We have modernized pig farms and refrigerators.
We make chorizos and other sausages.
And in the fields we breed cattle and fatten animals”, said the formerly talented soccer player who came from the Rosario Central youth academy, who went through Italy's Fiorentina.
More "footballers and peasants"?
The world champion
Paulo Dybala
bought "La Selva" for 5 million dollars, a 700-hectare farm near the towns of Sarmiento and Cañada de Río Pinto, in the north of Cordoba, a few kilometers from Camino Real, which he agricultural and livestock investment, leader in that region.
Lucas Alario
walks with his love for "Leona" Agustina Albertario in his field located 6 kilometers east of Tostado (Santa Fe province), along Route 98.
Carlos Manuel "El Puma" Morete
played for River and Boca, also for Independiente and Argentinos Juniors.
Almost retired from representing soccer players, today he works in agriculture in Santa Fe and has a forage shop in Capilla del Señor.
Diego “Coco” Capria
–brother of “Mago” Rubén, manager of Racing- knew glory as a soccer player and after his retirement he took over the reins of the family business, a sheep refrigerator in the Buenos Aires town of General Belgrano, in the Cuenca del Salado, that adds value to meat with growth potential.
In short, from the field of baseball to the field of production, which moves an entire country, there is only one step: the great decision and love for what is ours.
