EDMONTON

Silvana Romero is a pioneer in her country.

The striker is among a new generation of Paraguayan female soccer players, making a good account for themselves at the FIFA Under-20 Women’s World Cup.

With their performance, they hope to inspire the next generation of girls as the game continues to grow in the South American country.

“We think the effort here that we’re putting in at this World Cup is very important,” said Romero at a news conference on Monday. “There are a lot of people, almost the whole country, that are watching and we hope to be an inspiration to the girls back home that want to play this game.”

Soccer is the top sport in Paraguay, as is the case with nearly all South American countries.

The women’s game, however, is still in its infancy and the team competing at the U-20 World Cup in Canada represent the foundation of their female program.

“The truth is, that at this moment, women’s soccer in Paraguay is reaching a level that has never been seen, thanks to the help it’s receiving with the FIFA development programs,” said Paraguayan head coach Julio Gomez. “They gave us help and direction and we’ve taken on something that is hard to do in South American counties. It’s been a process.”

Paraguay is one of two South American qualifiers taking part in this year’s tournament.

They finished second at the South American championships, losing to Brazil in the final. Along they way, they had some impressive victories over Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador and Colombia. But the program is relatively new compared to the more developed women’s soccer nations.

“We focused our female national program on two age groups, the Under-17 and the Under-20,” Gomez said. “We took the players from the local school tournaments and selected them to play on those teams. Right now we are seeing results very quickly. We talked about the direction of the project and we thought it would take more time to get to this level. In all honesty, we thought it would take four, six or eight years.

“But the Under-17 team qualified for the World Cup and the Under-20 team made it to the final of the South American tournament against Brazil, which we lost 2-0, but we played the game at a very high level.”

Paraguay goes into their game against France Wednesday (3 p.m.) at Commonwealth Stadium, with a chance to qualify for the quarterfinals of the tournament. They defeated Costa Rica 2-1 in Montreal on Saturday, lifting them into second place in Group D. A tie against France could be good enough to see them go through to the next round.

“In something that you can either call good fortune or luck or hard work and dedication, we’ve found ourselves some talented young girls that wanted to work on their game,” Gomez said. “They have come together very quickly with the work they’ve put in. The first thing we wanted to do is put them in a good place physically. Secondly, we worked on the technical part of the game and then the strategic and psychological part of the game.

“It came together very fast. Under two years we were able to qualify for the Under-17 World Cup and the Under-20 World Cup. This is giving us the motivation to continue working because we are seeing the results very fast. Sometimes as I coach I asked myself if the big teams have stayed where they are or if the little teams are advancing?”

The success of the Paraguay program is making players like Romero role models to young girls back home.

Having taken up the game in elementary school, then continuing to play at the University level and now for a professional club team in Paraguay, Romero was devoid of female role models herself.

“I didn’t have a female role model until Marta from Brazil,” Romero said. “I had a chance to go to Rio and I went to the Maracana Stadium to see her handprints in their Hall of Fame. That was very influential to me and I said that one day I want to be like her.”

derek.vandiest@sunmedia.ca

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