The enemy flip flops, the mannequins trick and the “remote control of God”: 10 unmissable anecdotes of Carlos Bilardo

Carlos Salvador Bilardo never went unnoticed. Friction midfielder, with tactical sense; obsessive trainer, capable of being in the most unusual details; doctor, journalist; even actor. The “Narigón” offered a thousand facets and starred in dozens of anecdotes that illustrate his inimitable personality. Here, a compendium of 10 stories that define his legend, today portrayed in the series “Bilardo, the Soccer Doctor” released by HBO Max.

EXPERT IN PUNCTURES

Osvaldo Zubeldía’s Estudiantes marked an era for being an excellently structured team, with personality and a winning profile: they won six titles, including three Copa Libertadores and one Intercontinental Cup. However, that team was also discussed for its tricks. And one of the myths that accompanied it was the use of pins in the melee marking of opponents. Carlos Bilardo was always pointed out as one of the practitioners of the practice.

“You can imagine if you got to prick a person the blow he gave you. You couldn’t, they would kill you,” he knew how to argue. “You had to invent anything. Like the one about the drum (in the 1990 World Cup, against Brazil), which wasn’t true either. Students could not always reach the finals. It was a rating issue, they didn’t want Students. It was anti-football”, he completed.

However, in other interviews he “played” with the pins issue, giving truth to his employment. “At that time I used, yes, because there was no AIDS”, he pointed. He even appealed to the device when he starred in an advertisement, in which he assured that the punctures had the sole intention of checking the blood sugar level of the rivals…

IT’S GATOREI, MISS

It happened during his last time on the substitute bench, in Estudiantes, back in 2004. In the substitute bench of the monument stadiumbefore the start of the meeting between River and “Pincha”, Carlos Bilardo uncorked a bottle of, apparently, champagne. He poured himself into a chic glass, toasted the camera, took a sip. “I’m going to the field to have fun. We are going to correct the mistakes of Estudiantes with improvisation,” he said after the game, making it clear that the montage served as a response to criticism from Hugo Orlando Gatti, a goalkeeper who was a regular in the calls of Menotti in the Selection, but that with the “Doctor” he stopped having opportunities.

The “Gatorei” episode became legend

But show business does not have the same scientific rigor as the blackboard. And the strategy caused him some problems with the Justice. At halftime, after having observed the champagne scene, the prosecutor of Instruction No. 11, Claudio Barcia, intervened, understanding that the bottle contained an alcoholic beverage, prohibited in a place where a sporting event takes place.

It was there that Bilardo pronounced the already mythical phrase: “You don’t have alcoholic beverage, miss, you have Gatorei. You were wrong, miss, tell him, Mr. Bilardo says he has Gatorei. There is no alcoholic beverage. You have to go try it”. Héctor Baldassi, match referee, tried to calm him down, but “Narigón” was already at maximum temperature.

While his team recovered energy in the locker room, Bilardo kept his guard up on the side of the playing field, trying to explain that he had only used the isotonic drink for his prank. “I would deliver the bottle with a seal, because I don’t know if they are going to put something inside it. I have to look for a chemical expert because in three days they will open the bottle. They are going to find Gatorei with water. I have 50 years of football and they think that I’m going to bring alcohol to a court,” he continued, indignantly, while struggling with authorities, the police and anyone who approached him.

The fury did not take him out of the game at all: in the midst of the tugs, he decided to change and made Mariano Pavone enter for Rafael Maceratesi. He could do nothing to change the result: River beat Estudiantes 3-0, with goals from Fernando Cavenaghi -2- and Marcelo Salas.

The final badge did not make Bilardo change his irony. He promised, before the media, to uncover another champagne in the concentration. Although, knowing the impact of defeats on his spirit, he would hardly have removed the cork from a bottle.

WITH OWN “BAR”

He recounted it in his book, “Doctor and Champion.” In 1968, Bilardo was invited to the program Controversy in Soccer, and among the journalists and the people in the gallery – who according to the “Narigón” was dressed up – criticized him harshly. In 1969 he was invited again, but he was prepared: he took 20 friends to the stands to defend him. The story did not end peacefully: a brawl was generated with pineapples and chairs flying through the air. Many years later he returned as coach of the National Team… and he brought 60 companions.

MANNEQUINS HAVE “LIFE”

The “Doctor”, who was a pre-candidate for president, put into practice an infallible home security system, in the best “My poor little angel” style. An idea that he should have patented and that he narrated on a TV show 15 years ago. “When we lived at home, the lights were always on, with a doll next to the window, to make a little shade. and outside they would think there were people awake. I went to Once and bought mannequins, dressed them a little, put them sitting down. So people go and shoot or at least wait if they want to steal. And you always have to put on the radio, let it be heard… If they don’t clean your house… “he made his peculiar strategy public.

THE COUNTRY, EVEN IN THE FOOTWEAR

–Geleri, Geleriwhat team do you want to play for, tell me, what team?

– How, Carlos?

-What you heard, in which team do you want to play?

-In Argentina, Carlos

-And why do you have the Brazilian flag? Can not be. From Argentina or Brazil

-But, Carlos, flip flops are like that, it’s the brand

-But you have to choose, you have to choose, cover it, cover it

Geleri (who is none other than Marcos Angeleri) came across the idea when he was walking around Balneario 12, at a high point during the Estudiantes preseason, in the summer of 2004. A Carlos Bilardo smeared with sunscreen (to the point that the players, in a low voice, they baptized him as “the joker”) he reproached the defender, one of his protégés in his management, for the lack of attachment to the homeland of his footwear. Resigned, Angeleri retired to the changing rooms of the place and returned to the beach with a piece of tape covering the Brazilian flag that adorns the sandals of the famous brand.

WITH WOMEN’S PERFUME

During the training stage that the National Team developed in Tilcara to adapt to the altitude prior to the World Cup in Mexico ’86, the players were invited to a party. And they had not had much space for recreation, so the “Doctor” gave them permission until one in the morning to participate. But he did not stay waiting for them with crossed arms. To make sure everything was alright she disguised herself as a coya woman with a black skirt, espadrilles and a typical hat. She appeared on the spot and danced on the floor with the footballers.. “We were with Ruggeri at the bar and we saw Bilardo come dressed as a colla. We couldn’t believe it. He asked us what we were drinking. I told him soda and he authorized us to stay two more hours, “revealed” Checho “Batista.

BURGERS DO NOT STAIN

Bilardo always agreed to be a cabulero. And in Mexico 86 the rites were exacerbated. 48 hours before the debut in the World Cup against South Korea, a group of players took their leisure time to tour a shopping center in Mexico City. And getting out of the routine, they sat down to eat hamburgers and soft drinks, but Dr. Raúl Madero saw them and reprimanded them. Until Bilardo appeared… The anecdote is in “Argentina-England, the party”, by Andrés Burgo.

“Leave them,” ordered the coach, who sat next to them and ordered his hamburger. Well, Argentina won. And the scene had to be repeated two days before each meeting. And Bilardo was adding condiments. “We had to invite three women to sit at our table to come together. Shortly before the end of the tournament, our wives arrived and Bilardo went crazy. He asked them to leave, that he gave them money to buy things, but not sit at the table with us,” said “Tata” Brown.

A WORLD CUP? NOTHING TO CELEBRATE

Bilardo did not celebrate the World title. He did not even treasure the champion medal. Why? His obsession with detail. The 3-2 against Germany, after Argentina was in the lead, was too much for his perfectionist spirit. Above all, because of how the conquests of the Germans arrived. “No, I didn’t celebrate anything. Two corner goals. I have no medals. I don’t have a photo with the Cup. As a player, I had been practicing the set piece since 1968. And that they score a goal like that after one, two, three years training and watching videos. That’s why I don’t have a medal. I took it off. It was wrong,” she recalled from a distance.

THE LESS THOUGHT BLACKBOARD

History, in the voice of Olarticoechea

Preview of the 1986 World Cup: Carlos Bilardo needed to convince Jorge Olarticoechea to return to the National Team, from which he had left distanced from the DT. So, he asked her to meet after a Boca game. “Vasco” warned him that he was going with his family to his native Saladillo, but “Narigón” was not daunted by the refusal. He set up a meeting point on Autopista 25 de Mayo. “He found a brick, went to a wall in a house and drew the technical talk. He explained to me that he wanted me to return to the National Team as a flying marker, people passing by looked at Bilardo making lines on the wall. They couldn’t believe it” , he remembered with a smile.

“At the time I was angry with him, but then I came back. It was always with a lot of respect from both sides, we didn’t have bad feelings. Bilardo was very special to us, even though he made us run a lot and train when we weren’t used to it” , full.

GOD’S REMOTE CONTROL

In 2005, the “Doctor” ventured into acting: he was the protagonist of the program “Bilardo’s thing”, a program that America broadcast on Sundays at noon, in a costumbrista style. Together with the DT, Rodolfo Ranni, Mariano Iudica, “Bicho” Gómez and Sabrina Rojas, among others, participated.

Of course, even if it wasn’t about football, the coach couldn’t shake his obsession with winning. Therefore, he appealed to his ingenuity and found a method to “help” the show grow in ratings: bought a pack of remote controls and, aboard a car, at the time of the program he toured bars and restaurants. And from the door or when the waiters were distracted, if the TV in the place was not in America, “magically” the channel was changed. The “Narigón”, at its best.

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