Peru vs. Paraguay: meet the players of the 'bicolor' with the most matches against 'Albirroja'

The teams of Peru and Paraguay will meet this Tuesday, March 29 as part of the 18th date of the South American Qualifiers. It is the last day where it will be defined whether the 'bicolor' achieves, through a victory, its qualification to the pre-World Cup repechage in Qatar 2022. To do this, Ricardo Gareca must send the best of his squad to the field, although there are players who already have experience facing the 'Guaraníes'.

And it is that several elements of the 'white-red' face their third qualifying process, considering that a good group had a past in the selection led by Uruguayan Sergio Markarián. For this reason, we will tell you which players from the current squad have the most matches against the Paraguayans.

The first to top the list is Yoshimar Yotún. The current Sporting Cristal steering wheel has 11 matches against 'Albirroja'. Between friendly matches, Playoffs and Copas Americas, he is the Peruvian who has faced him most times from the current squad of the 'blanquirroja'.

Luis Advíncula is following him with 10 games played. 'Bolt' has taken over the right-back since Markarian's time, where he was an undisputed one in that position, but with the current DT his performance improved significantly. A different case from that of 'Yoshi', who with coach 'charrúa' played left-back the whole process for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, although with Gareca he works as the organizing wheel of the game.

In third place and tied with 'Lucho' is Christian Ramos with 10 matches. In fact, the two together with Yotún come from the previous process with the 'Magician', so they have faced the Paraguayans in long battles in the various competitions.

Pedro Gallese is the fourth name to sneak into this select list. The Orlando City goalkeeper of the MLS has 9 duels played against the Paraguayans. In his case, his beginnings with the national squad were with Pablo Bengoechea, but with Ricardo Gareca it was with whom he obtained regularity under the three suits.

Christian Cueva, Renato Tapia and Aldo Corzo are the players who complete this list with 6 commitments each. In the case of the defender of Universitario de Deportes, he also participated with the selection of Sergio Markarián, although with the 'Tigre' he alternated in more matches and was constant.

CRUCIAL MATCH EXPERIENCE

All this experience of the players will be necessary to face a match of this magnitude. And although Paraguay is eliminated and out of any chance of qualifying, it has in mind to finish in the best way, in addition to the fact that its players plan to fill the eyes of coach Guillermo Barros Schelotto for the next Playoffs. For this reason, it will be a serious rival, adding the factor that they have nothing to lose. In that sense, responsibility and pressure fall on the 'white-red' (fifth with 21 points), who, if she achieves a victory, goes squarely into the repechage, regardless of the results of her direct rivals such as Colombia (sixth with 20 points) and Chile (seventh with 19 points). Otherwise, it will happen if Peru loses or draws its match. For that, you must expect the previous teams in question to lose their matches to qualify for the repechage.

Now, if the national squad gets the pass to the repechage, it will be the second time in a row that it will play a match in these instances. He already did so for Russia 2018, when he faced New Zealand in back-and-forth matches. However, on this occasion, a single match will be played in June of this year in Qatar, the same venue of the World Cup.

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