Chicharito and Alphonso, multiverses of the passion for football

LOS ANGELES — Two soccer players. Two prints. Two catharses. Two contrasts. Two experiences. Two attitudes. Two ends. two moments. Antipodes. antagonistic. Alphonso Davies and Javier Hernandez.

One of them explodes in a video. He collapses. Shouts. He writhes on the floor. Whine. cry. He ruffles his hair. He gets up. He is dismayed. He gets confused. Hysteria. He does not know how to make the bubbling, seething bliss within him erupt; that threatens to explode through the senses and feelings. Canada goes to the World Cup, but without him. It does not matter. Alphonso Davies has myocarditis, and his heart pumps blood irregularly. But, passion and love? Those climaxes for football, no electrocardiogram can measure them in the body of the Bayern Munich star when seeing his selection in the list of Qatar 2022.

Another smears blood in spurts on its horizon. Red plasma in the latest generation plasma. Search, crouch, shoot, riddle, annihilate. And she laughs, shouts, curses, profane, celebrates. While Mexico is experiencing a calamity against the United States, at the same time Chicharito plays and promotes himself through Twitch. And he decides to ignore the national team. There, his colleagues and compatriots die of nothing in a 0-0, while simultaneously he fights to the death in a video game. Followers of his flawed war obsessions denounce: “Those who asked him about the game in Mexico, or why he wasn’t watching it, he blocked us. And he threatened that whoever kept asking him, he would block him.”

Yes, Alphonso Davies and Javier Hernández, different universes, opposite universes, parallel universes. multiverses.

Will their origins be so antagonistic? Belly of anemia and belly of fullness? Cradle of famine and cradle of gold? One is a child of war; the other, modest stepson of the pampering.

Fleeing the Second Civil War in Liberia, the parents settle in a refugee camp in Ghana, along with almost half a million of their compatriots. That’s where Alphonso Davies was born. In 2005, at the age of five, the family emigrated to Canada. That’s where the story begins. He is considered one of the best defenders in the world. On January 14, 2022, myocarditis is detected. He is sent to rest and observation. Zero soccer. He says that he is ready to come back. German doctors are cautious.

Will he make it to the 2022 Qatar World Cup? No one has a definitive answer. Just good wishes. Davies says yes. Canada coach John Herdman hopes so. Bayern Munich coach Julian Nagelsman hopes so. The doctors are still waiting, while the Liberian-Canadian begins to force the march. His heart is a kamikaze.

Davies’ video captivates, seduces, moves. The World Cup is his but it is not for him. He wants to be there. He was born, raised and developed to be there. Everything, his body, his mind, his fervor, his passion, say yes, but the muscle that governs him still says no.

Meanwhile, Javier Hernández publicly signs the divorce of a marriage that was already broken, damaged, demolished, dilapidated, rusty. While Mexico suffered against the US, he pulverized rogues and bad guys. How to interpret that a self-confessed, noisy, incisive, longing and eager to return to the Mexican team, who ensures that in today’s squad, has many great friends, disdain “his Tri”, and choose, better, mow lives algorithmic before a game console? Immaturity? Resentment? Tantrum? Dignity? Hypocrisy? All previous?

Undoubtedly, the player, in his leisure, can choose to dedicate himself to whatever he wants. He has the absolute freedom of the human being. Especially if he knows that he is the object and subject – not a victim – of the bad blood of Gerardo Martino and Yon de Luisa, but also of his sins.

But, then, in the case of Chicharito, that of: “If I didn’t want to be in the national team, I would have already retired. As a soccer player I am doing what my grandfather, my father, everyone taught me: if you want to be a national team player you have to stand out in your team and from all the people in your country to be called and considered, that is how my grandfather taught me May he rest in peace, my father, and that’s what I’m doing, and that’s what’s on my mind.”

So contrasts. antagonistic worlds. extreme passions. One, Davies, offers and begs, with his heart still healing, for Canada to reserve a World Cup spot for him. Another, Chicharito, has sent El Tri to the “friend zone”, where handkerchiefs and diapers are discarded due to passing passions or eternal contempt. One is a son of war, like every warrior; the other is the son of his passions, rather than his passions.

True, without a doubt Javier Hernández tries to purge all his sins. He is in the best shape of him in the last four years. He has the right to a call. It is the goal that Mexico needs and that Martino looks for with a guide and not with objectivity. Perhaps that verbal contrition and regret, however, falls apart when he plays “his” selection of his and he selects instead exterminating frustrations in video game fantasy.

Thus, Alphonso Davies and Javier Hernández, twins of the contradiction. One who wants so much, and another who has begun to want so little.