Several weeks ago, 17-year old Alejandro Vazquez Nárino left his house in Paso Del Norte, a neighbourhood of Juarez, a Mexican border city near the country’s frontier with the United States of America.
Alejandro went to buy a birthday present for his father, but never made it back home.
When he was a kid, Alejandro had a dream of relocating to the northern side of the border and studying in the USA. His family is not poor. By the standards of Juarez, his family actually counts as an upper-middle class family. Crossing to the US for a day or for short periods was something pretty usual for them.
From Alejandro's room, you can see the American city of El Paso on the other side of the border, as it is literally twenty metres from his home. But in terms of fulfilling his immigration dream, the distance was much further.
On his way home, he got caught in the line of fire between some local drug cartels and the police. On that day, Alejandro died alongside four other innocent civilians. In his backpack, the police found a shirt of the local football club, FC Juarez. It was his father’s birthday present.
Inside Alejandro's room, there is a FC Juarez scarf, as he was a dedicated supporter of the team and hadn’t missed a home match all season. When his father agreed to an interview for the local media, he barley spoke of Alejandro's dream to relocate, but he did talk a lot about his son’s passion for the local football team.
Before we get back to football, here is some background information on the complex situation in the city of Juarez:
As mentioned, Juarez is a border city in northern Mexico, bordering the American city of El Paso. The short distance (literally a dry river - 10 metres wide) between these two cities is a haven for drug cartels who smuggle drugs and illegal immigrants into the US through underground tunnels. More than 40% of the city’s population live below the poverty line, which creates makes a huge breeding ground for potential "soldiers" for the violent drug industry in the area. Since the beginning of 2015, more than 700 people have died because of cartel-related activities and the life expectancy in Juarez is much lower than in the rest of Mexico. The high demand for drugs on the northern side of the border simply fuels more violence and crime on the southern side.
The drug cartels do whatever they want, without much interference from the local police. That’s hardly a surprise, considering the fact that the cartels bribe the policemen with more money than their salary. The cartels build smuggling tunnels into US territory and even try to bribe the US security forces. They commit killings and cause terror in the city while promoting their business, but also in order to create fear in the minds of the local population of Juarez. However, within this Hell on Earth called Ciudad Juarez, there is a unique place, a shelter from all the bad things outside. Even the violent drug cartels do not dare to approach and intervene in this place. This place is the local football stadium. It is a De facto Paradise inside of Hell.
In this isolated place, there is what people would call "normal life". People come to support the local team and get several hours of quality time with their friends and family. The local team, FC Juarez, was founded less than a year ago by Mountain Star Sport and El Paso based business woman Alejandra De la Vega. De la Vega has strong business and personal ties to the city and she is the chairperson of the club.
Professionally, the team’s manager is Sergio Orduña, a real football man who has years of experience managing teams in the Mexican second division. Orduña understood that in order to succeed in Juarez, he needs to build a team based on experienced foreigners and young talented Mexicans players. As the team Captain, he brought in 25-year old attacking midfielder Edgar Pacheco, who grew up at Atlas de Guadalajara, had a spell at Tigres UANL and was capped for the Mexican national team a few years ago. The Honduran, Alexander Larin, arrived on loan from Tigres, Edgar Mejia from Chivas Guadalajara and the Brazilian Derley signed from Club Leon. The team’s forwards are the El Paso native Juaquin Alonso Hernandez from the U-23 United States Men’s National Team and the Brazilian Leandro Carrijo, who has already scored 13 goals in 20 games this year.
The club’s debut season was phenomenal. The team qualified for the playoffs and, earlier this week, won the tournament after a 3:0 victory at home against the famous Atlante from Cancun (3:1 on aggregate). Now the team has guaranteed their participation in the qualification game after the Clausura 2016 and might even play in the Mexican top flight next year.
"Alejandro had a dream that was cut short, not only due to the drug cartels. They are just the symptom of the disease of living without a hope. Now there is some hope. Children will dream of becoming football players, not soldiers for drug cartels".
For Alejandro's family maybe it's too late, but for the children of Ciudad Juarez there is hope for a better future. The name of this hope is FC Juarez.
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This article was first published in Hebrew at Taco de Hummus, a Latin (mainly Mexican) football blog. Meir Lozowick is a football lover and writer. Follow him on Twitter here: @Lazoninho and check out his unique website at http://tacodehummus.com/.