The athlete took advantage of international tours to buy things that he could sell on the Island.
14ymedio, Havana, 15 September 2024 — Leonardo Hierrezuelo didn’t even earn one peso as the goalkeeper of the futsal* team in Havana. This was the main reason that led him to flee hours after the national team arrived in Spain at the end of August to face preparation matches. The decision, he tells the Spanish newspaper La Vanguardia, was made “a week before, when the tour in Portugal began.”
Hierrezuelo had been double provincial champion with Old Havana, national champion with Havana and Under-23 champion in the I Caribbean Games of Guadalupe 2022. Despite that record, he only received 350 pesos per month for the medal he won two years ago. He had to work all week in a bicycle repair shop to support himself. Like all athletes, he took advantage of international trips to “buy things that could sell well in Cuba such as sports shoes and clothing,” he says.
“Living in Cuba is very difficult; it has always been bad, but after coronavirus everything has gotten worse,” he emphasizes to the Spanish newspaper.
In Hierrezuelo’s home, that situation is palpable. “It is very difficult to find food in supermarkets, and when there is any, it’s at very high prices,” says the 23-year-old athlete. In addition, his mother “only earns about 3,000 or 4,000 Cuban pesos [monthly], which is equivalent to 10 euros.”
Being in Huelva, Hierrezuelo decided to leave the hotel where his team, Los Leones del Caribe, was concentrated, in the early hours of dawn on August 27. Everything was well planned; after the escape, he contacted a friend who paid for his train ticket and who is now hosting him.
The Cuban athlete has taken a step towards freedom, but his immediate urgency is to get a job and be able to stay in Spain to help his family on the Island. He does not rule out continuing his professional career in some Spanish futsal club.
Before Hierrezuelo’s escape on August 24, the Camagüeyan Harold Aguilera, 22 years old, abandoned the Cuban team in Portugal. He is considered one of the “leaders of the locker room and a regular closer.” He was also part of the Phygital futsal team (digital futsal) that recently competed in the Brics 2024 Sports Games in Kazan, Russia.
The escapes of Harold Aguilera and Leonardo Hierrezuelo have been a hard blow to the team led by Osmel Valdivia, who was looking for a competitive team to face the Futsal World Cup in Uzbekistan.
Cuba had a shameful debut against Brazil’s Verdeamarelha by losing 10-zero, an encounter that the official newspaper Jit considered a battle between “David of Judah against the giant Goliath of the Philistines.”
* Futsal is related to soccer but played on a smaller, harder, indoor court with only five players, one of whom is a goalkeeper.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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