2024-06-10 01:10:14
Textual content: Raul del Pino
Photograph: Dairon Reyes / Instagram
A few years earlier than Lionel Messi determined to move to Inter Miami and the MLS, the Cuban Dairon Reyes was referred to as the identical because the Argentine star when he did pirouettes with a worn-out ball in some misplaced land within the Havana municipality of Arroyo Naranjo.
That boy was operating on the best aspect and it appeared like he had the ball tied to his foot. That uncommon expertise and plenty of different turns that his life took led the “Cuban Messi” to land in 2019 on the academy of the identical staff within the Florida metropolis, the place he would later reside an expertise that will ceaselessly mark his nonetheless younger profession.
The second occurred in September 2022 when the Argentina staff performed a few pleasant matches in the US and selected the “rosita” membership services as its headquarters. Dairon, at 19 years outdated, was already a part of the second staff, and was one of many common “legionnaires” within the calls of the Antillean squad, each under-20 and seniors.
In one of many coaching periods towards the Argentine staff, the Cuban excelled towards the South American soccer gamers, the identical ones who three months later would make historical past by lifting the World Cup in Qatar. The Albiceleste gamers and training employees, astonished, had been stuffed with reward for him, and Messi himself, when Dairon approached him to ask for {a photograph}, advised him that he had the abilities to play in Europe.
“It was one of the best day of my life. A dream come true,” he advised Play Off Journal weeks after that historic day. “To listen to world-class gamers say that, it is unimaginable. “I’m fortunate,” he recalled on that event.
His photograph with “one of the best in historical past” went world wide, however what Dairon didn’t know is that a little bit greater than a 12 months later he would repeat it, now each carrying the identical pink Inter Miami uniform, and with Messi carrying his eighth Ballon d’Or.
However man doesn’t reside on reminiscences, a lot much less the athlete. Reyes’ promising profession was interrupted within the spring of 2023 resulting from a extreme damage he suffered in certainly one of his legs. As a matter of destiny, his pressured departure from the fields occurred just a few weeks after the signing of the star from PSG to Las Garzas turned official.
Who is aware of if if he had not torn his anterior cruciate ligament, the Havana winger would have already shared the grass with the Argentine quantity 10. If one thing has characterised the administration of coach Gerardo “el Tata” Martino”, signed months earlier than Messi’s arrival within the MLS, it’s the alternatives he provides to the membership’s younger abilities.
Virtually a 12 months after the damage, Dairon has returned to play with Inter Miami II within the MLS Subsequent Professional. Time has handed since that promising teenager that the membership formally employed in 2022. Now he’s nonetheless a 20-year-old younger man , however he wants to indicate that he has the power to transcend in a corporation that has revolutionized soccer in the US.
Within the midst of this course of, the Cuban staff has opened its doorways once more. Coach Yunielis Castillo just lately included him within the record of 23 footballers who will start the lengthy and steep path in just a few days to qualify for the 2026 World Cup.
Reyes is likely one of the 15 “internationals” who will defend the nationwide staff and, given the brand new absence of Onel Hernández, he should assume extra stripes within the island assault. The Caribbean Lions will compete in an a priori inexpensive group A, the place Honduras is the favourite, together with Antigua & Barbuda, Bermuda and the Cayman Islands.
Exactly, the tricolor eleven will start its journey towards the tough “catracho” staff, in Tegucigalpa, on June 6, and can full this primary World Cup window on the eleventh towards the Cayman Islands, on the Antonio Maceo stadium, in Santiago de Cuba. The remaining two matches of the important thing are agreed for a similar month however in 2025.
With 13 earlier calls and a purpose with the Cuban senior staff, Dairon Reyes will search to benefit from this new alternative to reunite along with his finest model. Including high quality minutes and attaining an excellent consequence may even deliver good dividends together with your membership. If every part goes based on his plans, the long run could maintain one other photograph with Messi. That one, I hope, is of each of them sharing a ball on the grass.