Hello, my beautiful people of ‘La fe de Cuto’! This interview is amazing, I honestly did not imagine having a guest who is a legend, he is an idol, not only of Peruvian soccer, but also internationally. It is an honor, a privilege to be able to have it, besides, it radiates a lot of humility, the legend Don Hugo Sotil.
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The popular ‘Cholito’ Sotil He opens his heart to us and reveals unknown parts of his life: his beginnings in football, his closest friends, his time at Barcelona and reveals urban legends and football anthology anecdotes. Unmissable conversation.
Don Hugo, your physique is your genetics or it is because of a certain job you did. His calf is amazing…
I am from Ica and I grew up in a dirt field, I started playing with a rag ball, my ball was for socks. The problem was to fill it, I put paper, everything I might to make it a ball, a soccer ball. When I was 12 or 13 years old, I moved to the neighborhood of The victory. I didn’t know anyone, I stayed stuck in my closed alley, I had no friends, but there, behind the Cine Mundo, there was a field and I went to see the businessmen of La Parada who were going to clear their heads for a while, to do his championship. At 12 years old I was already playing with them, I played four or five games as if nothing had happened. They paid me 10 soles per game and a plate of food. That was my job on Sundays. Little by little we settled in, the older people looked at me and I had the opportunity to join the team of my loves, which is alliance.
What is your neighborhood in Lima?
the future, in The victory. I have played 8 and I have won 7 cups in The Little World. We went with bodyguards. We played for a company and they sent us with brave people, most teams go with people who protect all the boys, but the bodyguards are not going to get involved in the game, you have to put up with everything.
How were your beginnings in football?
I reach the youth to alliance When I was 14 years old, there I met the ‘Baby’ Cubillas. We were two years, undefeated champions. I played midfielder, the ’10’ was Teófilo, the ‘9’ was one of the La Rosa brothers. I had two very nice years there and then I migrated to another team, I went to Aliaga Sports Club. The president, later, was my father-in-law. I played on the team and worked in his factory, carrying 200-pound bags of coffee… that also strengthened my legs. I never wore a girdle, I told my classmates, ‘why do you wear a girdle’, and now I realize why, my spine hurts… hahaha. Then I arrived at Galian, I was there for two, three years, and there the Municipal Sports and took me to his club. We came out champions in second…
Don Hugo, your son Johan had a move that I know belongs to you, the one that removed José Soto, how was that technique born?
That was born in Ica, when I played in the field. There were some summits, the ball went there and I had to climb it, there I also did legs, ran and hooked so that it didn’t fall into the ditch. There I learn that hitch and one day I do it in front of the Atletico Chalaco, Arizaga, Pinto, Prado… marked a move, they give it to me on my left side, which I control better, and the three of them come together, they wanted to kill me, and I feint him and the three of them, one on top of the other. The next day, a boy comes to ask me for an autograph and shows me the photo from the newspaper La Crónica where they were one on top of the other, I hadn’t even noticed, and the boy asks me, can you show me that play? LOL. It was still a night game, you mightn’t see anything, it was all dark. A hug for all the boys. One day I got to know Prado, we ended up crying, hugging…
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Then Didí arrives at the Peruvian team, for the World Cup in Mexico 70
After qualifying in ’69 they were already asking me for the national team, but the people who go to the stadium hadn’t seen me play, some journalists just knew, it was never Didi. Chale and Mifflin went to the stadium and watched the game and Didí asks them, ‘how’s the little boy they talk regarding so much’, and they say, ‘he knows what, call him soon because he plays better than all of us.’ Later they called me up to the national team and everything started, people looked at me with different eyes.
How was the reaction of the group? How did they receive it?
I had to go play with him. Espinoza In Ica, we always traveled by bus but on that occasion the Federation sent a special car to send me to the concentration in Ancón. They were playing cards, in that gang I was Eloy Campos, Dimas Zegarra, Chale, La TorreI didn’t even look at the casinos, I looked at the players, and Eloy Campos told me, ‘Cholito, why don’t you make your jokes like when you play?’ He shared the room with Eloy Campos. That was my reception, then they had to put up with everything I said, they no longer interviewed them, they interviewed me.
For 1973, the Barcelona board came here to Peru to take Cubillas, but they took you.
They came from Mexico, played Muni vs. Alliance, we won that game and that night I left with four cases of beer to celebrate. When I’m starting a box I saw four gringos, I came out it was the teacher Dino Michelthe coach of the Mechanical orange, at the start he told me, ‘do you want to go to Spain?’ I told. He told me, ‘come at five in the morning and have your papers in order to go to the embassy’, he would have told me at 9 or 10 hahaha. That night he just looked at the beer. He came at five in the morning and what an embassy, we went to the ambassador’s house and at night he was already traveling. President Belaúnde was there, we arrived in Barcelona and there were around 300 photographers and journalists and I told Belaúnde, ‘a singer, an authority, is coming’, and he told me ‘no, they have come to see you’. I did not know, I had heard but more I had heard of the Real Madrid, but they had five drinks, I had just one. They tell me, ‘you have to hold a press conference’, I didn’t even know what it was, and in the end I had to respond, not to all of them, but it was anecdotal.
I got to a club where we all wanted to get to, I was lucky, and I hope that if a boy gets there, he doesn’t come back, that he has his future there… I’m very grateful to the club, for telling you that I left Barcelona in ’77 and Every year my wife and I are invited to a vacation of 15 or 20 days. Happy because now Johitan is there, he left with the whole family, he has even taken his puppy, he has gone to take some training courses. I never saw him play, I never went to the stadium, he gave me a hard time.
You are a good ambassador of Peru in Spain
If you have faith you arrive, I had faith and I accidentally arrived at Barcelona.
Was it true that they came to see Cubillas and took you away or was it just speculation by the press?
I never knew, and if I did, it was a version that came from here, from journalism. If I had known, what am I going to order four cases of beer hahaha… I didn’t know. Two days later I was debuting, I debuted with Municipal in a tournament, it was a Peruvian team, an Argentine, a German and we beat them five to zero, they had taken Aguero as reinforcement, he was my lorna, but he put pressure on me. He also wanted to show himself, he had brought his resume. Then they toured several European games, Municipal was only invited by Barcelona, for the pass, and then they moved contacts there and stayed for regarding 20 days, they went to Switzerland.
That year his compadre also arrives, Johan Cruyff
He had signed almost the same days as me, but there was a clause that said he mightn’t play, he stayed at the same hotel as me. His son Jordy was the same age as one of my daughters, there they used to play in the hallway, from there something told me that he was going to be a good friend, may he rest in peace. I was the only one who might hug him, kiss him, he bathed alone, he was ashamed, but I accompanied him, he told me ‘what are you doing here, you came for something else’ hahaha. He was fond of me, a beautiful person, he was skinny, but he had great legs, they called him El Concorde.
You make it your compadre
He is not my spiritual compadre, he is my friendship compadre, he had taken me in affection, he always stopped with me, he called me compadre and I called him compadre, and we stayed like that. My two daughters had already been born, my two sons Johan and Jair were born in Lima and there I took the opportunity to name my son following our friendship.
An anecdote with Jairzinho
In 1974, 1975, I didn’t play in La Liga because of dual nationality, the rest of America played a game and that team included Amancio, Eusebio, Johan Cruyff, Rivelino, Jairzinho, Jani Rivera, we won 14-0. It was a team that was in the first division, but we had players who were still playing… like Johan, Pelé, there were still people who were active, it was a good team. I had to go back to Barcelona and he told me… ‘let’s go to my house’, it was the middle of the week, we went to listen to music in Brazilian, how they played rhythm, in the end he told me ‘cholo, where are you going’, they were around three in the morning, he tells me, ‘no, let’s go to my house’. A bomb. At 7 in the morning we were already bombshell. At 9 o’clock they knock on the door, it was his old lady, ‘son, your breakfast’, and I say, ‘mamita, bring me a caipirinha’ hahaha. The first time he ate black beans, he asked me to stay, and what was I going to stay, he was already awake, I don’t know if he would have slept. They drink and dance, I sit.
Tell us regarding that historic win at the Bernabeu that they beat Real Madrid, five scored…
We had younger people, they had a Pirri who was already finishing his degree, Amancio, Netzer, a German, and later they were young, but we were already an age, 26 years old. The game came and they started to attack, but we had a goalkeeper who caught them all and the 20 minutes later we conceded two goals. In the end comes that play, I make the header, the fifth goal, I ran out as if to go to the eastern tribune, as is celebrated here in Peru, and Cruyff grabs me by the neck, ‘where are you going’ he tells me , ‘to celebrate my goal,’ ‘hey, you want them to kill us here’… it’s because there was no mesh there. He put up with me, I would have liked to celebrate that goal in my own way.
And that story regarding his yellow Ferrari that he bought
They all had Maserati, I had a small Fiat hahaha. So I said, ‘no cholito, you have to buy a cart’ and worst of all, they didn’t pay, it wasn’t their car, they gave it to them to use, I didn’t know that, I bought it later. I regretted it, I said ‘what have I paid for’. There was a man who had a lot of money, he bought a yellow Ferrari, just like mine, and he knew which disco I was going to, I warmed up my car, and he bought the same color and put it on the door, the one who paid duck was me. A few days later the coach calls me, he had blamed me for stopping at the disco every day. One day I went without a car, I took a photo of the plate and I took both photos, mine and the other’s. He went to find out and apologized to me. I went but I got hot, only on Sundays, the coach gave me permission on Sundays, on Monday I went to the medical exam and I already had it hard at home, because they controlled my weight, I had to weigh 70 kilos, the Tuesday they were already weighing you, if on Thursday at the time of the practice match you were not at that weight you were not on the list, even if you started, so on Thursday I was already at 70. I ate pure meat, but on Monday I ate my beans . I drank champagne, when I went to that nightclub, that guy sent me champagne, I never met him, he never showed himself, but I think it was the same owner. There I heard the great singer Olga Guillot. I have been lucky enough to meet Camilo, Julio Iglesias. One day we went to play in Cali and he sang with Mercedes Sosa and Julio told me ‘cholo, your muscles are delicious’, he surprised me, I told him, ‘don’t go on hahahaha’.
