Peru Head Coach Ricardo Gareca has admitted he is concerned about the fitness of his players.
The veteran tactician oversaw a commendable 2-1 defeat to Brazil in Peru’s opening Group C match at the 2015 Copa América.
Despite an impressive showing that saw his side drawing 1-1 until Douglas Costa struck in second half stoppage time, Gareca was left with some fitness issues to contend with.
The Argentina-native has worries over forward Jefferson Farfán and Fiorentina owned full-back Juan Manuel Vargas, while he also notes his whole squad are showing signs of fatigue, ahead of Peru’s second match against Venezuela.
“Jefferson Farfán has been suffering with an allergy – he’s under treatment,” he said in a press conference, as reported by website ca2015. ”He was a doubt until the beginning of the game, but later we tested him and he responded well, but he’s still having some problems so he made a great effort.
“Vargas, he asked to be substituted, so we did. The idea is to maintain the players in the best way possible because this doesn’t end here.
“It was important to get a good result in the first game, but we still have two finals in front of us and we need our players in form – that’s why we made the changes.
“We are going to analyse the way that they are recovering, because some of them were struggling by the end of the 90 minutes – so we depend more on recovery when deciding what team will play against Venezuela.”
Peru will face Venezuela at Estadio Elías Figueroa Brander in Valparaiso, Chile on Thursday.
They currently sit 3rd in Group C, level with Colombia, who have also failed to secure a point so far, after being defeated 1-0 by Venezeula in their opening match.
