After taking over the role of Director of Mexico’s National Teams in late March, Nestor de la Torre has announced the full re-structuring of the Federacion Mexicana de Futbol youth system from the ground up.
Via Goal
“I want to make an institutional structure that is not dependent on people, which can be very difficult, because we must give valor to the institutions, so I present an organizational chart,” de la Torre told the media as he presented his national team project.
“Every department will be designed to fulfill a job. There will be offices at the Mexican national team’s training grounds (The High Performance Center) with the necessary tools to follow up on young players. There will be a medical department for growth and nutrition. We are conscious that Mexican players do not have good qualities in their physique, speed, and potency so we must work in that aspect. That is why all those departments will be at their disposal to see if there is improvement,” de la Torre said.
For de la Torre the importance of the youth project is to ensure that players carry out a process with the national team; qualifying to every world cup in their respective age-groups.
“By the time a 14-year-old player turns 23 he can be in the senior national team having had disputed three world cups and around 300 official FIFA matches plus any other friendly games.”
“Our main objective will be to fight for the World Cup with structure and sequence,” explained de la Torre. “I am not discovering anything new; I have had the opportunity to travel to many places, seeing installations and their player process. They are models for success that have been present in football. We can take what works and design it according to the necessities of Mexican football; similar to what France and Holland have done”.
Although the Mexican national team general director did not specify or set a time frame for his project to achieve its goal he did mention that in around 10 years players will be ready to challenge for the World Cup.
“By the time the 2018 World Cup rolls around; players that are now 14 years old would have completed a process and will be structured people. They will be accustomed to competition and be prepared mentally and physically. I dare to say that we will fight for the World Cup. I am not saying that we have currently resigned to that possibility but we will try to fulfill a process by 2018 as many before us have already done so.”
