Cristian Damico to represent AFA at Copa Santa Fe final | OneFootball

The former vice president of Newell's will be at the Final of the Copa Santa Fe, which will be played at the 15 de Abril stadium this Saturday, representing the AFA. That's why he spoke with our colleagues from ADN Gol and analyzed the tough moment Newell's is going through, with elections coming up on December 14.

You know, I really never had the chance to meet him or run into him personally.

We’ve faced each other in derbies, but, well, the management on one side, the coaching staff in the locker rooms. Honestly, I never had anything with him per se. But unfortunately, it’s a significant loss for Argentine football.

All the clubs, including Newell's itself, have expressed their condolences to all the family members, which I think is the right thing to do. And well, that’s how it is, unfortunately life brings you these things.

Yes, yes, unfortunately, even though everything was set for Chiqui himself to come to the match, the date coincided with the qualifiers. You know he gives it a lot of importance, but he’s clearly very interested in us being able to attend on behalf of the AFA. The truth is, in these 10 years, the Copa Santa Fe has been very good for the development of federal football in the province, something that has always, always been a priority during Tapia’s administration, and it has managed to make football much more federal, even taking the national team to play matches in different cities around the country, not just in Buenos Aires.

Yes, well, first and foremost, Tata, Taylor, Galgo, people who really love watching football, you’ll see Gerardo at any stadium watching a match, well, they came to watch the reserve match, where Newell's played against the reserve team, which is actually coached by Lucas Bernardi, who is highly sought after by Tata. The truth is, we’re going through a complex situation here in Rosario, in our club, complex in every aspect—at the institutional level, at the economic level, but the most serious is at the sporting level. Newell's has rarely in its history been in a situation where it is eight points above the bottom spot in the average table with five matches left to play. Unfortunately, this current administration didn’t do what it had to do, didn’t fulfill its campaign promises, and today we find ourselves in a situation where 99% or 100% of the fans are dissatisfied. Tomorrow, Friday, we have a very important match against a very tough opponent. Hopefully, things can start to turn around because the situation is reaching a very tough point. You know that when you drop to Nacional B, it’s not so easy to come back up. Unfortunately, it’s a very competitive and complicated division, and even the big teams struggle to get out once they fall in.

Look, we’re still fighting because we believe that every day gained by moving the elections forward is another day to face the next transfer window, which will be crucial for Newell's, because we’ll clearly be starting in the bottom spots in the relegation and average tables, and every bit of time we can gain is important to put together a competitive squad, which is what Newell's will have to do. Newell's needs to bring in at least five or six players who are starters in Argentine football or from abroad to have a competitive team on the field. So every day counts like gold. I see it as complicated. The opposition, we all agree on moving the elections forward, but the reality is that if the president of the institution doesn’t show some greatness and call an extraordinary assembly to modify the electoral calendar—which is already underway with an electoral commission that regulates the timing and supervises the entire process—it’s impossible. I don’t see it happening, unfortunately. We’ll have to make it to December 14. In the meantime, we continue working with our group on the football plan, which is the main thing, so we don’t get to the 14th and find ourselves with all this mess in our club.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇪🇸 here.