Juan Carlos Osorio stares at his feet, his fingers twitching in his pockets. “I’m very sad,” he declares, “both me and the players are hurting a lot today.” He kicks a piece of turf and lifts his chin from his chest to look blankly into the distance. As manager of the 14-times Colombian champions Atlético Nacional, he has lifted the last three league titles and won two domestic cup competitions. He is the most successful manager in the history of Colombia’s most successful team and was inspired into football management after a spell living across from Liverpool’s training ground where he watched Gérard Houllier’s team night and day. And yet, there’s still something missing.

For Osorio, that something has become an obsession; a continental trophy that will catapult his name to global attention and allow him a stab at his dream job: to manage in England.

Last Wednesday, his opportunity finally arrived. After a tense penalty shootout victory in the Copa Sudamericana semi-final against São Paulo the week before, the stage was set as Atlético Nacional hosted the Argentinian giants River Plate in the home leg of the final.

With almost 60,000 fans piled in to the Atanasio Girardot – capacity 44,000 – Nacional put in a memorable first-half performance. “They couldn’t handle us,” Osorio says “we played with such intensity.” But at half-time and for all their dominance, Nacional only had Orlando Berrio’s strike to show for it. After the break, the tables were turned.

A former Arsenal trialist, Sebastián Pérez, hit the bar for the home side early in the second half, but a few minutes later River equalised and in the end the Argentinians could have gone on to win it. “It was a historic chance to beat a historic rival and we blew it,” Osorio moans. “I’m distraught.”

Several minutes later at a petrol station on the outskirts of Colombia’s second city Medellín, Osorio is locked in debate with the guy filling up his car. “Profe, forget about it, there’s no use crying over spilt milk, onwards to the second leg.” Osorio spins off his driver’s seat and looks the pimply teen in the eye. “You can mess up in the small games that don’t matter, but not ones like this. This does matter.”

During lunch, over coffee in a local bakery, and then on the football ground at his kids’ school, the 52-year-old engages with anyone who approaches him on where it all went wrong. While his 10-year-old son trains, for more than half an hour on the sidelines Osorio berates the child’s PE teacher for daring to use player tiredness as an excuse for the collapse. “That would be the easiest excuse, but it just isn’t true, we got scared and we bottled it.”

Back in his car, the phone calls pour in as Osorio liaises with players, agents and the club chairman. “This is my life, I talk football and I spend time with my kids.”

Talking football is an understatement; he lives and breathes the game. Born in 1962, Osorio was an average player at his local side Deportivo Pereira before packing it all in to go and study in New York. For 13 years he attended Southern Connecticut State University while saving money for a trip to England. In 1997 he crossed the Atlantic heading for Liverpool to study a Science and Football degree at John Moores University.

“I learnt so much from England,” Osorio says. “When I arrived there I tried several times to watch Liverpool training sessions, but they wouldn’t let me in.”

Undeterred, Osorio began banging on the doors of the local houses that overlooked the ground. “11 Crown Road,” he beams. “I saw there was a crack in the brick wall so I walked up to the house opposite and demanded to live there. I explained what I wanted to do and the owners organised a meeting in which they allowed me to stop there. I spent almost two years in that house, and was very happy.”

It was during Houllier’s time in charge at Anfield and the then 35-year-old Colombian would wake up early every morning and peep out of his bedroom window, scribbling away in endless reams of notebooks on what he saw.

“If it was raining I had to watch from the window, but if it was a nice day I would drag a table out and watch from outside and over the brick wall. At night I would do the same or go and watch the academy.”

In 1997 Osorio returned to the United States as assistant at the Metrostars – now known as New York Red Bulls – before a call from Kevin Keegan, the then manager of Manchester City, who convinced him to return to England as a conditioning coach.

Indelible marks from his time in England still remain, in particular Osorio’s manic squad rotation policy that was surely inspired by watching Houllier’s Liverpool. In over 200 games in charge at Nacional, Osorio has never once fielded the same back-to-back team, with even the goalkeeper chopped and changed from one game to the next.

“That’s something I learnt from England where everybody rotated. In Colombia that was something very new and at first everybody was against it,” Osorio says.

Keeping players fresh has been essential this year as Nacional have racked up a staggering tally of 85 games – and counting – that is surely a world record for 2014. But there’s no doubt that Wednesday’s second leg against River is the most important. So much so that Osorio has said he will do something special to mark the occasion. “There are few clubs as big as River Plate, so I have said that if we win I will get an Atlético Nacional tattoo.”

Lifting the Copa Sudamericana trophy would also edge Osorio a little closer to one day fulfilling his dream. “I deeply admire the English game,” he says. “I would die for the opportunity to one day manage there.”