Nery Castillo Call-Up: Yay or Nay?

Nery Castillo is almost certainly going to play in the friendly against Ecuador on November 12, despite not playing top-level football since the summer. Manager Sven-Göran Eriksson was originally going to call him up for the qualifiers, but he didn’t know where he was.

Nery is currently rotting in the Manchester City reserves and clubbing with Big Brother has-beens. His loan ends this winter and it’s unknown if he’ll have to return to Shakhtar Donetsk or if he’ll end up going to another club. His transfer to Real Betis was snubbed in the summer transfer window, and the possibility of him playing at Chivas was also snubbed recently (complete with a statement by The Brow saying that he doesn’t want to play in the Americas. Do you enjoy the Citeh reserves then, meng?)

Here’s a tidbit on Nery’s history with the national team:

In the summer of 2007, Nery Castillo got his first cap in a match against Iran, in his birthplace of San Luis Potosi. After a long controversy over which national team he would choose to play for (eligible for Greece, Uruguay, and Mexico), he chose El Tri without hesitation. The match against Iran was considered a warm welcome to the player.

Nery made his scoring debut in the Gold Cup with an easy tap-in match against Cuba. However, he gave us a taste of what was yet to come in the Gold Cup final against the United States. His speed and control of the ball was so scary that the American defenders stood little chance. He even set up Andres Guardado’s first goal after an impressive run down the field.

In the Copa America, he scored a wonder goal against Brazil in the opening match and immediately became a fan favorite. He also scored two goals in the 6-0 thrashing of current CONMEBOL leaders Paraguay.

Since then, he has made no mark in the football world. He played the September 07 friendly against Brazil, and had little impact on the match. His last match with the national team was in March against Ghana, and he made little impact on the match as well (and even missed an open goal after faking out the keeper).

Nery’s Playing Future

Nery hasn’t played a match with the Manchester City senior team since the pre-season, and even then he was a sub. He is likely to be sent out to loan again when the winter transfer window opens, unless the rumors of Juande Ramos joining Shakhtar are true and he helps him break into the senior team (not too likely).

Nery could use the playing time. Not playing at Manchester City doesn’t mean that he’s a bad player, it just means that he’s not needed there. There has been cases with players in the past (Guillermo Franco, Jared Borgetti) in which they didn’t get much playing time at their clubs in Europe but got called up to the World Cup squad.

On the other side, playing in Europe shouldn’t be the deciding factor in him getting a call-up to the national team. I mention Europe because if he is rotting on the bench at a club in Mexico, there would be no shot in hell that he’ll get a place in the national team. It’s arguable whether he deserves the call-up in place of another striker getting regular playing time (Antonio De Nigris comes to mind, as he’s doing well at Ankaraspor).

It’s obvious that Nery is talented and has proven to be the difference in a match, but why does he deserve a call-up if his last impressive performance was over a year ago?

For now, we just hope that Mr. Castillopoulos gets back on track and ends the Greek drama of finding constant football. Good look, Oedipus (I mean, Nery).