In 2018 it was champion of the Uruguayan Women’s League with Bohemios and South American U15 scorer in Puerto Aysén. Since then, Obras Sanitarias de Argentina wanted to take it away. But only in 2020 Josefina Zeballos was encouraged to take the step. With an interruption of 11 months, due to the covid-19 pandemic, the shipowner grows by leaps and bounds and last week it became champion of the Argentine Federal.
“After the 2018 South American and in 2019, they offered me to go, but I felt that I was still very young to go live alone in another country. I dared to take the step in 2020 ”, he told Referee. In April he just turned 18.
The experience was short-lived because on March 17 he returned to Uruguay after the cancellation of all activities in Argentina.
“I was thinking of coming back in 15 days, but I was only able to do it on February 22 of this year. I was training for 11 months for Zoom ”.
By then, the Argentine Federal was already started. The tournament is played by more teams than those that take part in the Argentine League where the financial requirements are greater.
In the first phase of the contest, they beat the group together with Centro Galicia, Unión Florida and Española de San Vicente. Later they traveled to Rosario to dispute a triangle with Talleres de Paraná and Talleres de Gálvez de Rosario. In the last phase they defeated Independiente de Neuquén, Red Star de Catamarca and in the final to Berazategui.
Courtesy Germán Ruiz, Instagram @ germanlr73
A Uruguayan champion in Argentine basketball
This team had been the one that eliminated Obras in Final 4 of the last League, which was retaken in February of this year. The next league will start in October and after two days of vacation, Zeballos and his teammates resumed training last Thursday.
“I feel very comfortable here, the companions are already my friends and they all received me in the best way,” she said.
Zeballos he receives a salary and lives in a flat in the residence that the club has. “I have a television, a bathroom and a single room. We are four players who live in the club where there is a dining room where food is served. Obras is a talent recruiting club and when someone new comes to try or stay, we try to make them feel comfortable and integrate them as quickly as possible ”.
In September the competitions in training and age will begin, Zeballos can play in both U19 and U21, but in October he will return to the main team.
Following in the footsteps of his brother
Zeballos began chipping the ball following in the footsteps of his brother Juan Manuel. First in the neighborhood square, then in a couple of practices in Tabaré and finally in Bohemios. He was then seven years old.
One day, Pablo Proto, in charge of the Bohemios school, saw her and invited her to join.
“All the coaches that I had contributed things to me. First Proto with his assistant Santiago Gómez, Carlos Vázquez, Nicolás Altalef, Enrique Berhouet, Javier Sánchez, Matías Galo, in the selection Victoria Pereyra and el Gallego (Alejandro) Álvarez and in Works I have Santigo Petersen, Francisco Pirani and Patricio Mitchell who they teach every day, ”he commented.
Asked about which facets of the game he feels he has improved, Zeballos replied: “I improved quite a few things, but I still have a lot to improve. I improved the intensity a lot, defending one by one, also reading the game, both in picanrol and playing one on one ”.
One of the core points where its progression is noticeable is in the physical. Since his arrival at the Argentine club, he has gained 10 kilos.
“I was always thin because my metabolism did not allow me to gain kilos, but I am very happy with how much I gained and how hard I can work. The club gave me a nutritionist, something that in Uruguay I had to work on my own. The key was to increase protein and carbohydrates. ”
Courtesy Germán Ruiz, Instagram @ germanlr73
The selfie of the champions
As his parents always instilled in him to continue his studies, In the mornings, study online a degree in digital marketing at a Spanish university.
Your contract expires at the end of the season and Zeballos is very focused on improving day by day in each training session and later in each game. “I want to be prepared to jump into another experience like going to Europe.”
Zeballos belongs to a Uruguayan generation where the years of work of Gallego Álvarez with Vico Pereyra began to bear fruit from below.
“In the South American U15 in Chile we beat Colombia for the first time,” he recalled about his first international experience in 2018.
Against Venezuela they lost by 16 and ended up winning by 18. That day Zeballos, a notable perimeter shooter, scored 44 points.
“It was crazy, I had no notion of the number of points I had, I just wanted to win to be able to play for a fifth place, I was with that adrenaline and the ring opened, but without all the effort of my teammates, so much to make me the curtains to pass the ball to me, nothing would have been possible ”, he recalled.
The following year, in 2019, he played the South American U16 in Barranquilla: “We went to fight as equals against everyone. Some Argentine players told us later that they did not want to meet us because we were a dangerous team. We beat Venezuela, but Argentina beat us by two points. In that tournament we clicked, we felt like we earned respect. Uruguay is no longer going to go to tournaments to enjoy the experience or to learn. He is going to compete “, he affirmed with pure conviction.
Now Zeballos improves to another level. In the Argentine League. His talent still has no ceiling to say where he can go.