Today's post is dedicated to Ivan Escanilla and all the other thousands of football players from South America or Africa who are shipped by agents to countries like Malta in the hope of landing a contract with a club, to eke out a living doing something they love and to live the dream of being spotted by a big club in Europe.
Through a chance meeting on a plane between Escanilla and someone in my family I found out that Escanilla was in Malta for a trial with a Maltese team. Escanilla, from Chile, is 31. He's been a journeyman footballer around South and Central America and the most recent club I found him listed as a player with was in Puerto Rico. It's hard to find any news for a player who wouldn't normally be in the news, but I wondered if that club in Puerto Rico still exists after last year's devastating hurricane. Or if the league is still functioning. So there he is traveling to Malta in search of another job, to keep his career going a little bit longer, to earn a few more pay cheques while his body can still do it.
For all the players we will watch in Russia this summer, many of whom have earned enough money to see them retire extremely comfortably, there are thousands more like Escanilla who do not know where there next dollar, pound or euro will come from. Every year, in Malta alone, there are hundreds of African and South American players who try out for teams but are not signed. And then they are probably sent to the next third rate footballing nation by an agency or agent who is also desperate to make a bit of money.
Escanilla was apparently on his way home to Chile to celebrate his birthday. Here's to wishing him a very happy day with good news to follow.
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