In Costa Rican football, the number of Mexican coaches leading First Division clubs (five) paradoxically exceeds the number in Liga MX (four). In most cases, there is a belief that prestige in football is no longer earned solely through results and knowledge in player development, but also through the work of endurance in organizations where representatives proliferate.
" If there are 10 promoters in the market and nine decide to speak badly of a coach just because he doesn't work with them, everything is more difficult,
" Mario García , a champion with Atlante in the Liga de Expansión and now head of Sport Cartaginés in Central America, told La Jornada . " Rather than analyzing other factors, more foreigners are coming to our football today because they say they're Spanish or Portuguese, and because of that, they think they know more than us
."
García, 56, has won three championships with the Potros since 2020 (two league titles and one Campeón de Campeones), but has been unable to secure his return to the top flight. " With promotion and relegation still a priority, and not knowing when he might return, our work is often undervalued,
" he adds, not hiding his surprise at the number of former national soccer players leading projects in the Costa Rican Promérica League .
"The only way to grow is to get out of that family 'corralito', win in results and grow in our work, because nobody hires a coach to lose," says Juan Francisco Palencia, García's rival at the helm of Sporting de San José and member of the group of Mexicans that includes Andrés Carevic (Alajuelense), Héctor Pity Altamirano (Herediano) and Javier San Román (Municipal Grecia), whose job opportunities in Mexico have become increasingly fewer.
