2023-07-13 03:01:00
“When I grow up I’m going to play for the National Team,” surprised her father as a child Vanina Correa, the goalkeeper for Central and the Argentine team, who at 39 will play her fourth FIFA Women’s World Cup, this time in Australia and New Zealand.
“That’s what my old man told me, I don’t remember,” Vanina, the most experienced of the National Team, stops short, since she was in all the World Cups that Argentina has played in its history, in dialogue with Télam, at break time in the concentration of the AFA property in Ezeiza.
Vanina Correa’s story appears as an example of personal and professional improvement. Born on October 14, 1983 in the La Carne neighborhood of Rosario, but raised in neighboring Villa Gobernador Gálvez, close to the south, from which it is separated by the Saladillo stream or a simple street, Vanina remembers those years: “I spent almost all my childhood in Villa Gobernador Gálvez, in my grandmother Felisa’s house”.
Daughter of Hugo Correa “who worked all his life in the Municipality of Gálvez” and Adriana Ojeda, Vanina grew up behind a ball on the pitch of Club Villa Diego Oeste, where she played with her three brothers -Alejandro, Darío and Mauro- and “when she was little she entered the mascot games,” her partner, the physical education teacher Victoria Culasso, confided to this agency.
“He (through his father) tells me that, I was always in the middle of my brothers playing ball in the square or on the little field of the neighborhood club, since I was five or six years old, but I played in the square because in that There was no children’s soccer for girls at that time”, Vanina recalls her beginnings. “One day the goalkeeper was absent, the coach asked who was up to save and she said ‘I’m going to the goal’,” says Victoria, Secretary of Government of the Villagalvense Municipality.
“I always liked football. First I played as a striker or a defender, I played anywhere, where there was a lack of one, I just wanted to play. One game the goalkeeper was missing, at 12 or 13 years old I was already half a kamikaze, I rolled on the ground without problems. There were no girls, so I played like one more”, reveals the experienced goalkeeper.
Asked regarding the origin of her career and her passion for the position, Correa assures that “I did it more as a sport because it was what I liked to do and since it was what I liked the most, my family supported me. You have to try to do what that one wants because it is the only way to live. You stay calm when you try it”.
At the age of 30, Vanina was the mother of twins -Luna and Romeo, who live with her and her partner- and left football for four years until one day coach Carlos Borrello called her to return to the National Team.
“I had met my goals in soccer, being a mother was a decision to fulfill myself as a woman. Playing once more was not something I set out to do. It turned out that I had returned to play with friends, in a more relaxed way, until one day Carlos called me and asked me if I wanted to return to the National Team. He asked me if I was coming back, I told him that I mightn’t because of the boys. Until he called me one day and I told him that I would (from the point of view of physical preparation) , he came back and that’s how we played the World Cup in France”, he explains his return to football following four years.
Regarding that return, Vanina acknowledges that “it is super difficult to keep up with time, keep up, but I did not suffer serious injuries, I did not have to tolerate pain, I am fine and it is a pride to be part of this group, where we have the responsibility to represent to a country whose men’s team is world champion, which is more difficult”.
With Central, the club of which she is a fan, Vanina finished in third place in the AFA Women’s Championship, a historic position in the tournament for the club. “It’s a source of pride that we’ve had chances to win until the last game and it leaves us with peace of mind that we gave it our all.”
Consistent with her origins, Vanina works in the Sports Area of the Municipality of Villa Gobernador Gálvez, where she coordinates the Ellas Juegan Program, which promotes the participation of girls, adolescents and young people in the practice of women’s soccer as a means of social inclusion.
“A little while ago we launched with the LIFA, the children’s league, two girls’ tournaments and I am super proud of the number of teams -13- that signed up, where more than 450 girls participate. I am there accompanying the Municipality, I feel that I am working with friends and that it is a space for them to compete and learn. It is very important that the Municipality be part of giving space to a lot of women and girls,” says Vanina Correa, who is recognized as “a warrior” on and off the pitch .
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