He debuted in February 2015 with number 30, defending the shirt from the Zamora football club in his native country of Venezuela. Six years later Yeferson Soteldo lIt has on its back the number 10 of one of the most emblematic t-shirts of world football, that of Saints of Brazil, with which Pelé shone and with which he won the Finals of the Liberators cup, measured on Palm trees.
“I know how the story went and he asked for T-shirt 10“, Dice Francesco Stifano, former coach and friend of the current player Saints of Brazil, in an interview with Mediotiempo.
“It wasn’t too big for him”
In front of Francesco it’s no surprise that “The dwarf “, as they nicknamed him Soteldo in Zamora I asked for the shirt that became famous and mythical Edson Arantes dos Nascimento between 1956 and 1974 and with which he won two titles from Liberators cup and two championships of the Intercontinental Cup, a predecessor of the now famous Club World Cup FIFA.
“It is an enormous joy what he achieves, but whatThat he got the 10 shirt does not surprise me because he says it is the 10 of the Santos because he’s like that, and they gave him the shirt with that emblematic number of Pelé and it wasn’t great at all, he’s shown he’s for great things, ” added Stifano, with whom Yeferson raised two titles in the Venezuelan First Divisiona (Update 2015 and First Division 2016).
And it was exactly in 2016 when Soteldo Y Stifano they played their last tournament together. The 41-year-old coach still remembers the words that the footballer originally came from the city Acarigua in the state of Portuguesa, he told him before going to the field to play the Final of Ida Football club Zulia on December 4, 2016 in the Agustín Tovar Barinas Stadium.
“I remember very important anecdotes… 2016 was a very beautiful year because the team was nervous during the warm-up. He hadn’t even changed and the big players told me: ‘Prof, the dwarf is not ready’, and I said “Come on Yeferson, let’s warm up.” The stadium was packed, the city was paralyzed, and he just took off his headphones and said, ‘Calm down professor, I’m going to win your champion,’ and well it was, ‘he recalled.
That night Yeferson scored the second goal with which Zamora won the first game 2-1. “The second or third play he took out two and beat the goalkeeper. The next he took two or three, they punished him, they didn’t whistle him and Gabi Torres He eventually pushed her ”. Seven days later they closed work in the field Zulia with a total score of 4-2.
Once the third star is embroidered on the club’s shield Zamora, Yeferson Soteldo has been taken over by Huachipato, a team that handed it over to the University of Chile. That was where Santos set his sights on him. On January 15, 2019, he hires it and officially presents it as his new ’10’.
He would be the second Venezuelan to win the Conmebol tournament
“He is an incredible player and an impressive person. Today we are good friends, thank you for the shirt you sent to my son, it is worth a lot to me, I wish him the best and nervous because he will be the second Venezuelan to win the Copa Libertadores“he claimed.
And it is that this Saturday, Soteldo will aim to become the second Venezuelan footballer to win the Libertadores. The first was Alexander war, winning with National athletic from Colombia in 2016.