Diego Martinez's era at Boca celebrates its first week this Tuesday and for now everything revolves around the imminent departure of Valentín Barco to Brighton in England. It is one of the novels of a summer transfer market that moves slowly, with goalkeepers as the main protagonists, and that has not yet made a name for itself in the squad of the La Ribera club. However, beyond the negotiations, the new coach is waiting for a reinforcement that is already in the squad. It is the Uruguayan Edinson Cavani, who will turn 14 on February 37 and was one of the great absentees in the first football training sessions of Xeneize.
What's wrong with Cavani? The experienced Uruguayan striker has a special routine to achieve the ideal set-up. It is a continuation of the task that he took to his native Salto during his vacations, where he worked with a program specially designed by Boca's physical trainers. The idea was for the former Napoli and PSG player to be ready for pre-season, but that didn't happen.
The reason is simple: the injury he suffered against Newell's, in the penultimate match of the regular phase of the last Professional League Cup, was much more severe than what was known. There was talk of a discomfort in the anterior rectus of his left leg. But it appeared to be more than just a fibrillar rupture.
Ailments sidelined him from the lost semifinal of the Copa Argentina against Estudiantes and the last match for the local tournament against Godoy Cruz, in Mendoza, but also forced him to take that meticulous work plan to Uruguay. So much so that the images he spread from his place in the world through his social networks were all of him exercising.
Cavani's rigor and commitment were not enough, given that he arrived on January 2, 50 days after the injury, without feeling at his best. And while it is true that he moved along with his teammates in the physical work sessions, the Matador is still not one hundred percent ready to practice soccer.
Hence his absence from the first teams that Martinez stopped this weekend, when the ball finally appeared as a vital element of the preseason.
Cavani's goal
The premise of the Gigolo coaching staff is that Cavani will be ten points before the start of the competition. They don't want to rush him because he also came from a semester in which he had not done a traditional pre-season in the middle of his somewhat untidy departure from Valencia, in the middle of last year.
Martínez expects a lot from Cavani, who in the second half of 2023 was present in thirteen games with the blue and gold, in which he scored just three goals (his victims were Platense, Talleres and Palmeiras). Too little for a striker of his career and international hierarchy, beyond the fact that Jorge Almirón's Boca was at times much more conservative than imagined.
Although time passes for everyone and the Uruguayan has already left behind his prime times, Boca believe that if he is healthy he will be a key part of the team's gear in this 2024 reconstruction. They believe that the pairing with Miguel Merentie, another Uruguayan, can pay many good dividends.
Cavani's agenda – and Boca's – has January 24 scheduled as the day of the starting point, since it would be the date on which they would face Central Norte de Salta in the first match for the Copa Argentina. Days later, the following weekend, it will be the debut in the Copa de la Liga Profesional against Platense, at Vicente López. The idea is that the Matador may have action by then. For now, you have to take care of yourself and wait.