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If his Father was Jamaican he would be Jamaican.
JULIÁN DE GUZMÁN
Squad Number 07/08: 6
Date of Birth: 25 March, 1981
Nationality: Canada (international)
Contract: 2005 - 2009
Transfer: Free Transfer (2005, from Hannover'96)
Previous Clubs: Hannover'96 (2002-2005), 1.FC Saarbrucken (2000-2002), Olympique Marseille (1997-2000)
Buy-out Clause: ?
Height: 169 cm
Weight: 68 kg
Position: Defensive Midfielder (central)
In 2005 legendary midfielder Mauro Silva (37) retired at Deportivo from professional football. That same summer midfielder JULIAN DE GUZMÁN (24) was signed on a free transfer, hence the comparison between the two players. Although there were doubts about his qualities at first and he had difficulties getting into the team, the second part of the season 2006/2007 was his breakthrough in Spain as well as internationally. In June 2007 he was voted as Most Valuable Player of the CONCACAF Gold Cup’07 tournament.
Coming from Canada, Julián de Guzmán quickly realized that to become a quality player he needed to move away from Toronto to Europe. Being the eldest son of family with mother coming from Jamaica and father from the Filipinas, sport played an important part at home. His mother was an athlete and his father practised all kind of sports and is a huge fan of local basketball club Toronto Raptors. It’s not surprising that short De Guzmán (168 cm) didn’t have a future in that sport and his father made him, and his younger brother Jonathan, joining local football club North Scarborough.
Aged sixteen in 1997, he was discovered by French football club Olympique Marseille. After having played at Olympique reserves for three years, in 2000 he accepted the challenge to play in the German second division at 1.FC Saarbrücken. That same year his brother Jonathan, aged barely twelve, joined him in Europe and started playing in the youth system of Feyenoord Rotterdam.
In 2002, De Guzmán made another step and signed at Bundesliga club Hannover’96. The club was recently promoted to the highest level and had hired Richard Moar as their sports director. Moar was a player of Deportivo in the 1970s and 1980s and later a personal advisor of president Lendoiro. It was Moar who achieved loan deals with several players of Deportivo (Jaime, José Manuel and Fernando), who became colleagues of De Guzmán. “With Jaime I became good friends”, De Guzmán said when arriving in Spain. Meanwhile, Fernando describes him as a “quit guy. But he was still young and has a big future ahead, he gave all during training sessions”.
His coach at Hannover, Ewald Lienen, defined him as a “dynamic and polyvalent defensive midfielder. But he cannot be compared to Mauro Silva, because he has become world champions and not only has been a reference at Deportivo. De Guzmán is smaller but great in recuperating balls, and he has some incredible moves. He’s more comparable to Makelele, although one cannot expect of him to play very offensively or to organize the game. But I am convinced he’ll triumph at Deportivo because he has been one of the best midfielders in the Bundesliga”. That final observation didn’t go unnoticed. The retirement of Mauro Silva was getting close when in January, 2005 news reports appeared about Deportivo being interested in signing him. One month later the deal was done and De Guzmán could arrive on a free transfer as his contract ran out out that summer. De Guzman's hand was forced when Hannover wanted an answer over the Christmas break on a contract extension. Other clubs seriously interested were Feyenoord Rotterdam and Tottenham Hotspur.
When arriving, Moar described him as having “a tremendous illusion. He’s a winner and on Sundays he performs like during training sessions. And for him it doesn’t matter playing against smaller of bigger teams. Despite being small he’s strong and has good technical capacities, and he’s very quick. He can play at several positions but his speciality is playing in the centre, like Duscher and Sergio”.
New coach Joaquin Caparrós of Deportivo also appreciated his skills and on 21 September 2005 he made his debut in the Primera División during a 1-1 home draw with Betis Sevilla. With it he became the first Canadian to play at the highest level in Spain. His first starting place he acquired some days later at Zaragoza and until the end of November he added six other starting positions to his name including home matches against FC Barcelona (3-3) and Real Madrid (3-1). He got Riazor cheering during last-mentioned match when his low drive gave Deportivo a 1-0 lead.
But De Guzmán’s problem that season would simply be that Caparrós preferred the duo Duscher-Sergio in the centre midfield. Between the end of November and early April, De Guzmán started just four other Liga matches and entered as a substitute in another four. But at the end of the season, he started six of Depor’s final seven matches of the season. The one he missed had to do with his sending-off during the match at Cádiz (1-1) with twenty minutes remaining. In total he played 1476 minutes Liga minutes (43% of a possible total) during the season 2005/2006.
However, his career experienced a set-back when at the start of the season 2006/2007 coach Caparrós again relied on Sergio, new signing Juan Rodrígez and defender Coloccini for the centre midfield positions. With Duscher out of favour, De Guzmán now had to cope with new competition. The situation became urgent when in December 2006 he still hadn’t played a single minute of the Liga campaign. Only on 16 December 2006 he made his first appearance during the home defeat against Athlétic de Bilbao (0-2). One week later Deportivo were fifteenth in Spain at just a few spots of the relegation zone. Something had to happen.
Looking back to that time, De Guzmán said: "I came into the season 2006/2007 thinking I'd get a much better chance of being a starter. But in the first half of the season I didn't play at all and I was definitely disappointed with that, so I was looking elsewhere to play. I didn't want to leave Spain at all, but if it came down to it I would definitely do it if it meant I could play, because I am too young to be sitting on the bench." De Guzman was linked with moves to Charlton, Sheffield United and Wigan in England, as well Dutch giants Ajax and a possible return to Germany. "During the winter break there were a couple of offers to go to the Premiership and I was kind of leaning towards that, especially not playing in the first half of the season".
But De Guzmán didn’t go. During the next two months Deportivo experienced an impressive revival. The team stayed alive in the Copa del Rey and experienced an 8-match unbeaten run in the Liga which took them to four spots up in the table and relatively safe from the dangerous spots. The turning point for De Guzmán at Depor came when he was included in the starting line-up for the home match against Real Madrid back in January, the team's opening fixture of 2007. De Guzmán started the matches of Depor’s run and was an important part of the team not leaking a goal for 451 minutes in a row. However, Deportivo couldn’t continue this run and finished the season anonymously. Still, De Guzmán made name and was one of the few high lights during the final months of the campaign. De Guzmán himself explained: "The home game against Madrid is when it all changed. It was the coach's last chance' if we would have lost that game he would have been fired so he played his last cards in that game, including me, and came out with the win and we played well”.
The player is satisfied with his current role in the squad and admits that his love for life in Spain has been rekindled in the last few months. "It's a dream come true to be out here, not just the football alone but the culture, the lifestyle ... it's amazing. Also, it is a dream come true to play at the Bernabéu and something that will take a while to settle in. The highlight for me is simply being here, being the first Canadian, representing my people and my country. I never thought I would have the chance to play in what for me is the top league in the world, and here I am. ... I'm very thankful and honoured to be in this position”.
“Now I'd prefer to stay in Spain and am very happy here. And as long as I get to play that is all that matters. If there is an opportunity to stay longer than the two years which I have remaining (on his contract), then I would definitely do it," De Guzmán said. "I'm very happy here and it's just unfortunate the team is not really living up to its expectations from previous years." About living in the city of La Coruña, De Guzmán mentioned that "we (the players) do get a lot of respect up there. Everybody knows who you are but they give you your space and are very friendly. "It's a small city, there's a lot of countryside up there, it's near the coast and is very beautiful. In the winter it rains a lot but for me it's not a problem because when I was living in Germany, the winters were pretty brutal. We get a lot rain in the winter but apart from that the weather is incredible”.
De Guzmáns highlight of his career was playing the CONCACAF Gold Cup’07 tournament (The Gold Cup is the confederation championship for teams from North and Central America and the Caribbean) in the United States which started on 6 June 2007. In January 2002 he made his debut for the Canadian national team. Five years later he scored both of Canada's goals in a 2-1 win over Costa Rica on June 6 in Canada's opening game in Miami. Canada finished as leaders of Group A, eliminated Guatemala in the Quarter Finals but didn’t reach the final because of a 1-2 defeat against the United States. Canada's Atiba Hutchinson appeared to have tied that game forcing extra time, however referee Benito Archundia of Mexico ruled that Hutchinson was in an offside position and waved the goal off, thereby eliminating Canada from the competition. Nevertheless, De Guzmán was selected by the CONCACAF Technical Study Group for the All-Tournament Team and won the overall tournament MVP award.
De Guzmán himself didn’t expect winning that trophy. "To be honest it surprised me, I thought Landon Donovan of the United States was going to win the award since they won the championship game. And It would have been better to touch the Gold Cup than win the MVP award. But I'm glad I was able to put Canada on the map in winning the award. All the thanks really goes to my teammates and especially Canada's fans, I would like to dedicate the award to them”.
Finally, there have been a lot of comparisons between Julián de Guzmán and his brother Jonathan who still plays at Feyenoord Rotterdam and is rumoured to become part of the Dutch national team. Both are midfielders with a fine technique. But Julián is much more experienced and not as offensive as his brother. Jonathan describes Julián as “a serious man. Easy, like me. He’s my big example and I admire his fighting mentality. We call each other almost daily and his support has helped me at difficult moments. We always joke about retiring at Toronto FC together, but we'll see”.
JULIÁN DE GUZMÁN
Squad Number 07/08: 6
Date of Birth: 25 March, 1981
Nationality: Canada (international)
Contract: 2005 - 2009
Transfer: Free Transfer (2005, from Hannover'96)
Previous Clubs: Hannover'96 (2002-2005), 1.FC Saarbrucken (2000-2002), Olympique Marseille (1997-2000)
Buy-out Clause: ?
Height: 169 cm
Weight: 68 kg
Position: Defensive Midfielder (central)
In 2005 legendary midfielder Mauro Silva (37) retired at Deportivo from professional football. That same summer midfielder JULIAN DE GUZMÁN (24) was signed on a free transfer, hence the comparison between the two players. Although there were doubts about his qualities at first and he had difficulties getting into the team, the second part of the season 2006/2007 was his breakthrough in Spain as well as internationally. In June 2007 he was voted as Most Valuable Player of the CONCACAF Gold Cup’07 tournament.Coming from Canada, Julián de Guzmán quickly realized that to become a quality player he needed to move away from Toronto to Europe. Being the eldest son of family with mother coming from Jamaica and father from the Filipinas, sport played an important part at home. His mother was an athlete and his father practised all kind of sports and is a huge fan of local basketball club Toronto Raptors. It’s not surprising that short De Guzmán (168 cm) didn’t have a future in that sport and his father made him, and his younger brother Jonathan, joining local football club North Scarborough.
Aged sixteen in 1997, he was discovered by French football club Olympique Marseille. After having played at Olympique reserves for three years, in 2000 he accepted the challenge to play in the German second division at 1.FC Saarbrücken. That same year his brother Jonathan, aged barely twelve, joined him in Europe and started playing in the youth system of Feyenoord Rotterdam.
In 2002, De Guzmán made another step and signed at Bundesliga club Hannover’96. The club was recently promoted to the highest level and had hired Richard Moar as their sports director. Moar was a player of Deportivo in the 1970s and 1980s and later a personal advisor of president Lendoiro. It was Moar who achieved loan deals with several players of Deportivo (Jaime, José Manuel and Fernando), who became colleagues of De Guzmán. “With Jaime I became good friends”, De Guzmán said when arriving in Spain. Meanwhile, Fernando describes him as a “quit guy. But he was still young and has a big future ahead, he gave all during training sessions”.
His coach at Hannover, Ewald Lienen, defined him as a “dynamic and polyvalent defensive midfielder. But he cannot be compared to Mauro Silva, because he has become world champions and not only has been a reference at Deportivo. De Guzmán is smaller but great in recuperating balls, and he has some incredible moves. He’s more comparable to Makelele, although one cannot expect of him to play very offensively or to organize the game. But I am convinced he’ll triumph at Deportivo because he has been one of the best midfielders in the Bundesliga”. That final observation didn’t go unnoticed. The retirement of Mauro Silva was getting close when in January, 2005 news reports appeared about Deportivo being interested in signing him. One month later the deal was done and De Guzmán could arrive on a free transfer as his contract ran out out that summer. De Guzman's hand was forced when Hannover wanted an answer over the Christmas break on a contract extension. Other clubs seriously interested were Feyenoord Rotterdam and Tottenham Hotspur.
When arriving, Moar described him as having “a tremendous illusion. He’s a winner and on Sundays he performs like during training sessions. And for him it doesn’t matter playing against smaller of bigger teams. Despite being small he’s strong and has good technical capacities, and he’s very quick. He can play at several positions but his speciality is playing in the centre, like Duscher and Sergio”.
New coach Joaquin Caparrós of Deportivo also appreciated his skills and on 21 September 2005 he made his debut in the Primera División during a 1-1 home draw with Betis Sevilla. With it he became the first Canadian to play at the highest level in Spain. His first starting place he acquired some days later at Zaragoza and until the end of November he added six other starting positions to his name including home matches against FC Barcelona (3-3) and Real Madrid (3-1). He got Riazor cheering during last-mentioned match when his low drive gave Deportivo a 1-0 lead.But De Guzmán’s problem that season would simply be that Caparrós preferred the duo Duscher-Sergio in the centre midfield. Between the end of November and early April, De Guzmán started just four other Liga matches and entered as a substitute in another four. But at the end of the season, he started six of Depor’s final seven matches of the season. The one he missed had to do with his sending-off during the match at Cádiz (1-1) with twenty minutes remaining. In total he played 1476 minutes Liga minutes (43% of a possible total) during the season 2005/2006.
However, his career experienced a set-back when at the start of the season 2006/2007 coach Caparrós again relied on Sergio, new signing Juan Rodrígez and defender Coloccini for the centre midfield positions. With Duscher out of favour, De Guzmán now had to cope with new competition. The situation became urgent when in December 2006 he still hadn’t played a single minute of the Liga campaign. Only on 16 December 2006 he made his first appearance during the home defeat against Athlétic de Bilbao (0-2). One week later Deportivo were fifteenth in Spain at just a few spots of the relegation zone. Something had to happen.
Looking back to that time, De Guzmán said: "I came into the season 2006/2007 thinking I'd get a much better chance of being a starter. But in the first half of the season I didn't play at all and I was definitely disappointed with that, so I was looking elsewhere to play. I didn't want to leave Spain at all, but if it came down to it I would definitely do it if it meant I could play, because I am too young to be sitting on the bench." De Guzman was linked with moves to Charlton, Sheffield United and Wigan in England, as well Dutch giants Ajax and a possible return to Germany. "During the winter break there were a couple of offers to go to the Premiership and I was kind of leaning towards that, especially not playing in the first half of the season".
But De Guzmán didn’t go. During the next two months Deportivo experienced an impressive revival. The team stayed alive in the Copa del Rey and experienced an 8-match unbeaten run in the Liga which took them to four spots up in the table and relatively safe from the dangerous spots. The turning point for De Guzmán at Depor came when he was included in the starting line-up for the home match against Real Madrid back in January, the team's opening fixture of 2007. De Guzmán started the matches of Depor’s run and was an important part of the team not leaking a goal for 451 minutes in a row. However, Deportivo couldn’t continue this run and finished the season anonymously. Still, De Guzmán made name and was one of the few high lights during the final months of the campaign. De Guzmán himself explained: "The home game against Madrid is when it all changed. It was the coach's last chance' if we would have lost that game he would have been fired so he played his last cards in that game, including me, and came out with the win and we played well”. The player is satisfied with his current role in the squad and admits that his love for life in Spain has been rekindled in the last few months. "It's a dream come true to be out here, not just the football alone but the culture, the lifestyle ... it's amazing. Also, it is a dream come true to play at the Bernabéu and something that will take a while to settle in. The highlight for me is simply being here, being the first Canadian, representing my people and my country. I never thought I would have the chance to play in what for me is the top league in the world, and here I am. ... I'm very thankful and honoured to be in this position”.
“Now I'd prefer to stay in Spain and am very happy here. And as long as I get to play that is all that matters. If there is an opportunity to stay longer than the two years which I have remaining (on his contract), then I would definitely do it," De Guzmán said. "I'm very happy here and it's just unfortunate the team is not really living up to its expectations from previous years." About living in the city of La Coruña, De Guzmán mentioned that "we (the players) do get a lot of respect up there. Everybody knows who you are but they give you your space and are very friendly. "It's a small city, there's a lot of countryside up there, it's near the coast and is very beautiful. In the winter it rains a lot but for me it's not a problem because when I was living in Germany, the winters were pretty brutal. We get a lot rain in the winter but apart from that the weather is incredible”.
De Guzmáns highlight of his career was playing the CONCACAF Gold Cup’07 tournament (The Gold Cup is the confederation championship for teams from North and Central America and the Caribbean) in the United States which started on 6 June 2007. In January 2002 he made his debut for the Canadian national team. Five years later he scored both of Canada's goals in a 2-1 win over Costa Rica on June 6 in Canada's opening game in Miami. Canada finished as leaders of Group A, eliminated Guatemala in the Quarter Finals but didn’t reach the final because of a 1-2 defeat against the United States. Canada's Atiba Hutchinson appeared to have tied that game forcing extra time, however referee Benito Archundia of Mexico ruled that Hutchinson was in an offside position and waved the goal off, thereby eliminating Canada from the competition. Nevertheless, De Guzmán was selected by the CONCACAF Technical Study Group for the All-Tournament Team and won the overall tournament MVP award.De Guzmán himself didn’t expect winning that trophy. "To be honest it surprised me, I thought Landon Donovan of the United States was going to win the award since they won the championship game. And It would have been better to touch the Gold Cup than win the MVP award. But I'm glad I was able to put Canada on the map in winning the award. All the thanks really goes to my teammates and especially Canada's fans, I would like to dedicate the award to them”.
Finally, there have been a lot of comparisons between Julián de Guzmán and his brother Jonathan who still plays at Feyenoord Rotterdam and is rumoured to become part of the Dutch national team. Both are midfielders with a fine technique. But Julián is much more experienced and not as offensive as his brother. Jonathan describes Julián as “a serious man. Easy, like me. He’s my big example and I admire his fighting mentality. We call each other almost daily and his support has helped me at difficult moments. We always joke about retiring at Toronto FC together, but we'll see”.
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