Following the complaints of the players in the 2024 edition, we tell you what changed in the organization and management of the Conmebol Libertadores.
2024 was a very particular year for the South American teams that competed in theConmebol Libertadores. The international tournament was going to be played initially in Uruguay, however, by order of Conmebol and, with 35 days left before the start of the tournament, the Uruguayan Football Association announced that it would not be the venue.
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This negatively affected the Uruguayan teams that were going to compete, Nacional and Peñarol, since they had two places to host and finally it was the Carboneras that traveled to Paraguay, which hosted for the third time in history.
After this, once the tournament began, the organization did not seem to be the best: the players had to warm up outside the playing fields and played in two stadiums whose fields were not in good condition.
Laurina Oliveros, Boca Juniors goalkeeper, was one of those who raised her voice in an interview after a match. “This is not the way to grow up, playing every three days in the heat it is, it's crazy. It doesn't enter any head”, she claimed and wished out loud: “I hope we can one day be able to compare it with the men's tournament so that they are all healthy and up to the task of being able to play a tournament properly, because all the players deserve better conditions.”
What changed from that Libertadores in Paraguay to this edition in Argentina?
This year the Conmebol Libertadores is being played in Argentina, at the Florencio Sola stadium, in Banfield, and at the Nuevo Francisco Urbano, in Morón.
The first to speak out on the matter wasVanina Preininger, who knew how to play in the final against Palmeiras with the Boca shirt in its 2022 edition. "The good thing is that the warm-ups are on the field, that is very positive. The Banfield stadium and its field are beautiful. Of course, there is a need for more dissemination so that more people come and all women's soccer in Argentina has to come and support the teams," she told FutFemGol.
For his part, Lauchi Oliveros also spoke out again regarding the conditions in this edition. “The fact that there is a slightly larger squad, with 23 players, changes you because you have more replacements; the VAR is a tool that adds and gives visibility. We have to improve the days between games, that is essential, because the physical wear and tear that we all have is impressive; and the playing fields, because Banfield is impeccable but Morón left a little to be desired. It would be good to add a field, also to take care of these fields,” he analyzed.
Another player who joined the reflection was Carolina Troncoso, who scored the first goal for the Gladiators in this edition of the Libertadores. “We did the warm-up in a small square.There are many things to improve and that is one of them, it always happens in the Libertadores that we have little space to warm up, and they are things that would be good to improve”, he asked.
Although we know that there is still a long way to go, there was concrete progress in the organization of this edition of the Conmebol Libertadores and the players recognize it. Now it remains, above all things, to adjust the calendar so that the most important club tournament in South America is not played in less than a month and to open more stadiums so that the sporting spectacle grows more and more.