The tiny island of Curacao is the smallest nation to ever attain a FIFA World Cup, an honor it earned with an unbeaten run via an 18-month qualifying match by which it outscored opponents by practically 2½ objectives a sport. However when it got here time to introduce Curacao to the world throughout final Friday’s match draw, the Nice One shot effectively extensive of the web, stealing its glory.
“Ka-rak-ko,” Wayne Gretzky sputtered to a world TV viewers FIFA estimated at greater than a billion whereas drawing the nation, which is pronounced koor-uh-SOW, into Group E for subsequent summer time’s match.
Few others are treating Curacao with such disregard.
“Every opponent deserves respect,” mentioned German coach Julian Nagelsmann, whose staff will face Curacao in its World Cup opener. “Curacao will be interesting to analyze. But we won’t make the mistake of underestimating them.”
That’s sensible, mentioned Curacao coach Dick Advocaat, who promised he isn’t coming to the U.S. for trip.
“No, definitely not,” he mentioned. “Otherwise, I can go to Spain.”
That’s not simply massive discuss on Curacao’s half. Although she be however little, she is fierce.
“We are difficult to beat,” mentioned Advocaat ,who at 78 is ready to change into the oldest coach in World Cup historical past. “It is a hard-working team with good organization. If you have a good organization, you can still do something against better teams.”
Though Curacao’s schedule has historically been chock-full of soppy opponents comparable to Aruba, Saint Lucia and Grenada, Curacao additionally thumped World Cup qualifier Haiti 5-1 and tied Canada within the final seven months. And it misplaced simply as soon as in final summer time’s CONCACAF Gold Cup.
If this World Cup is to have a Cinderella staff, Curacao will most likely be it.
A speck of an island with a land space of 171 sq. miles, Curacao is 40 miles north of Venezuela. And although it has a inhabitants of roughly 156,000, it has produced 17 main league baseball gamers — amongst them All-Stars Andruw Jones, Kenley Jansen and Jurickson Profar — probably the most per capita of any nation on the planet.
Soccer, nevertheless, stands out as the nationwide pastime, due largely to Curacao’s historic ties to the Netherlands.
Though initially settled by Spain, which thought of it an island extension of Venezuela, Curacao was a Dutch colony for practically 4 centuries. Due to its distinctive location between South and North America, most individuals in Curacao communicate 4 languages — English, Spanish, Dutch and Papiamentu, a Creole mix of Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and Arawak. And owing to the historical past of Dutch patronage, Curacaoans are among the many most educated folks within the Caribbean, with a literacy charge of 97%.
However in 2010, the Dutch dissolved the six-island territory generally known as the Netherlands Antilles, making Curacao a constituent nation inside the Kingdom of the Netherlands. A 12 months later Curacao performed its first worldwide match.
By then, some had already begun plotting a seemingly unimaginable path to the World Cup.
“Having an idea, having a vision, doesn’t mean that it will materialize. It takes hard work. It takes perseverance,” mentioned Gilbert Martina, a former hospital CEO who turned an advisor to the nation’s soccer federation in 2002, 9 years earlier than it performed its first sport.
Martina had these traits in spades — in addition to the diplomatic expertise to barter a peace between feuding golf equipment that had introduced competitors within the island’s native league to a halt.
“You can see the results,” Martina, now president of the federation, mentioned of the gamers who caught it out, greater than a dozen of whom started their careers earlier than Curacao turned impartial.
“It’s really a unity based on what they want to achieve. Not for themselves but for the coach, for the staff, for the whole country.”
Curacao gamers rejoice after qualifying for the FIFA World Cup in November.
(Collin Reid / Related Press)
Like most of his gamers, Martina was born in Curacao however spent a part of his life dwelling and finding out within the Netherlands. That shut relationship — the Dutch have continued to handle Curacao’s nationwide protection, overseas coverage and have sometimes interfered within the nation’s home politics since granting independence — is a giant motive for the soccer staff’s success.
Ten of the gamers on the roster for the ultimate World Cup qualifier in November play professionally within the Netherlands. Others are with high groups in Turkey, Scotland, England, Belgium and Germany. Advocaat additionally performed in Holland earlier than embarking on a 44-year teaching profession that included three stints with the Dutch nationwide staff and a World Cup look with South Korea.
Not surprisingly, Curacao’s method is just like that of the Netherlands, characterised by fluidity, adaptability and technical expertise, traits not historically related to most CONCACAF groups. Martina believes that philosophy, along with the graceful and manicured fields of a World Cup, will take his staff to a different degree.
“It’s going to be interesting, the World Cup,” he mentioned.
Along with Germany, a four-time world champion, Curacao will play Ecuador, runner-up to Argentina in South American qualifying, and Ivory Coast, the reigning African champion, within the first spherical. It’s a troublesome group however not an unimaginable one to get via.
Germany went out within the first spherical in every of the final two World Cups; Ivory Coast hasn’t performed on this match in 12 years and has by no means made it to the knockout levels; and Ecuador’s solely journey to the second spherical got here twenty years in the past. Plus eight of the World Cup’s 12 third-place groups will advance to the spherical of 32, one thing Curacao would doubtless do by successful simply one among its three group-play video games.
“In principle, every game is difficult, but it’s exciting to play there in that way, on the highest level, and we will see what we will do,” Advocaat mentioned. “We have a team with a lot of fighters. And as I know from the experience, [that is] always difficult to beat.
“So every opponent who will play against us has to play very well.”
They need to additionally discover ways to pronounce “Curacao,” as a result of by the tip of the World Cup, the island nation’s title may very well be higher identified than Gretzky’s.
⚽ You’ve learn the newest installment of On Soccer with Kevin Baxter. The weekly column takes you behind the scenes and shines a highlight on distinctive tales. Hearken to Baxter on this week’s episode of the “Corner of the Galaxy” podcast.
