The numbers and words painted on the artificial turf next to the pitch at the Estadio Municipal de El Alto in Bolivia’s highest and fastest-growing city are a source of pride for locals and a warning to opponents.

“4150 MTS OLD. SE JUEGA DONDE SE VIVE.”

“We play where we live” is the slogan next to the four numbers that clearly show what an exceptional location this is for a football stadium. Located 4,150 meters above sea level, the new home of the Bolivian national team in El Alto is one of the most demanding altitudes anywhere.

Venezuela will be the first national team to visit the stadium on Thursday night for a World Cup qualifier. The fact that the players spent the days leading up to the match doing breathing exercises and getting used to the low air pressure in hyperbaric chambers says everything about the difficulties they will face there.

That Bolivia is a difficult country to play football in is, of course, nothing new. In his book ¡Golazo!: A History of Latin American Football, Andreas Campomar writes about how “for years, Bolivian football created a fortress out of the Andean air,” which made the country a formidable opponent on home soil and contributed to some notable results, most notably a 6-1 victory over Argentina in 2009.

Diego Maradona, Argentina’s coach, was dejected. “Every goal was like a stab in my heart,” he said.

As for his players’ lungs, Maradona refused to use La Paz’s altitude (3,660m) as an excuse. This was probably wise, considering that he had played in the same stadium a year earlier, at the age of 47, to show his support for Bolivia after FIFA imposed a ban on international matches at altitudes above 2,750m above sea level in 2007.

FIFA argued at the time that the altitude posed a potential health risk for players and distorted fair competition – a claim Bolivia strongly denied. Evo Morales, then president of Bolivia, railed against what he called “football apartheid”.

The ban was soon lifted and international matches could eventually be played in La Paz again, although complaints from some countries – especially Brazil – never really stopped.

After a goalless draw at the Estadio Hernando Siles in La Paz in 2017, Brazilian star Neymar posted a picture on Instagram that went viral. “Inhuman to play in these conditions. Pitch, height, ball… everything is bad,” he wrote. The accompanying photo showed Neymar and his Brazilian teammates in full gear with oxygen masks on a sofa and armchairs at the end of the game. It was a bizarre scene.

Now, seven years later, Bolivia has gone a step further and decided to host the Games in El Alto, in fact around 1,840 steps further if we count in feet. El Alto is 560 m higher than La Paz – a city where tourists often need days and sometimes even weeks to get used to the thinner air, which forces their lungs to work harder to transport oxygen into the bloodstream.

Given all this, one wonders how Venezuela’s players will cope with playing 90 minutes in El Alto – they have not complained about the change of venue approved by CONMEBOL – and to what extent Bolivia will benefit from what the federation has described as a friendly match.

“Football is about details. That doesn’t mean we’re going to win with this (stadium change),” Oscar Villegas, the Bolivian coach, told the Associated Press. “We try to take care of details that allow us to be more effective.”

Oscar Villegas’ Bolivian team has three points from six World Cup qualifiers (Aizar Raldes/AFP via Getty Images)

“In El Alto we will try to play as intensely as possible and show them that they are playing on a new pitch where we were unbeatable (a reference to Bolivian club teams that play at this stadium in international competitions such as the Copa Libertadores and the Sudamericana).

“The psychological and emotional aspect also plays a role. This is something that will help us a lot.”

Given that the national team is in a difficult situation – it has lost five of its six World Cup qualifiers and is second to last in its group, and suffered three consecutive defeats at the Copa America in June – it is difficult not to be cynical about the motivation behind the Bolivian Football Federation’s decision to play its matches in El Alto, where the stadium capacity is much smaller than in La Paz. In short, it smacks of desperation.

Another view would be that Bolivia is simply making the most of its natural habitat and that it is no different from a nation that normally plays in extreme heat or sub-zero temperatures.

“I don’t think it’s important for Bolivia to win – I see it differently,” says Marco Etcheverry, who is considered one of Bolivia’s greatest footballers. The athlete.

“Bolivia is going through a difficult time when it comes to players and coaches. They have a lot of problems at the moment. The organization that defends the players – the union – is not in dialogue with the coaches. This is very bad.”

“They appointed a coach who is a good friend of mine and who I particularly respect to stand up to people so that they don’t get too angry because they wanted a Bolivian coach. I think they did it (moving games to El Alto) more to appease the fans. I think they believe they will win in El Alto – hopefully they will. But I don’t think it will be a big advantage for Bolivia.”

How much playing at high altitude has helped Bolivia over the years has long been a matter of debate. There is an opinion in Bolivia that all the talk about altitude has given the team a psychological advantage over opponents more than anything else, and that the potential physical effects, which can include nausea, headaches, fatigue and vomiting, are often exaggerated.

What we can say for sure is that Bolivia have been a different beast on home soil. 13 of their 15 points in 2022 World Cup qualifying have been earned in Bolivia, compared to 14 the previous season, including another win against Argentina (2-0).

The best way to illustrate the difference a home game makes for Bolivia is to look at their away form. Bolivia have won just one competitive match away from home in the last 28 years.

For all teams travelling to Bolivia, adaptation is a key factor. Mario Kempes, a World Cup winner with Argentina, tells a story about how national coach Omar Sivori decided to field two completely different teams for the home and away games against Bolivia in 1973, with only 14 days between matches to allow a group of players to acclimatise to the altitude. Kempes was part of the so-called ghost team that won 1-0 in Bolivia.

“It is very difficult to play at high altitude, you can feel it. But it is doable,” said Kempes The New York Times in 2009. “We prepared 15 days in advance. That was the right way to go. You do need more time, but today there is very little of it left.”

“Yes, some countries have the altitude on their side, but if you don’t have the necessary players, it’s really not an advantage.”

This is in line with Etcheverry’s views. “I think the altitude myth used to be a cause for fear, but today, thanks to technology, you can study everything – from what you need to eat to counteract the altitude, to the times you need to drink water, the quality of the food you need, the rest you need and the specific training you need. Now teams go there (to Bolivia) and have fewer problems than before because the managers are prepared.”

But that doesn’t mean that playing at high altitudes doesn’t have physical consequences. “Recovery is slower,” explains Etcheverry. “It doesn’t stop you from running: you do everything the same. The only problem is that if you exert yourself, you don’t recover as quickly. If you do a movement where you exert yourself a lot, run 30 metres and cross, you can do it. But running back and getting your breath is the hard part. That’s what costs you.”

Then you have to take into account the unusual behavior of the ball. When Daniel Passarella was coach of the Argentine national team in 1996, the team lost an away match against Ecuador in Quito, a city located more than 2,800 meters above sea level. The coach then made a comment that he never forgot: “The game is not over when the ball is level,” Passarella said afterwards.

So was Passarella right – is it true that the ball does not bend at height or at least behaves differently?

Etcheverry smiles. “The speed, the time and the distance the ball travels are different, that’s true,” he says.

“It flies faster,” adds Etcheverry, waving his hand to indicate the sudden change in trajectory. “It’s like the ball is flying in a straight line, for example, and at the end when it falls, it doesn’t have that downward curve. It falls (instantly), which is complicated for goalkeepers.”

Claudio Taffarel, the former Brazilian goalkeeper, could hardly have put the altitude down when Etcheverry’s shot from a tight angle flew between his legs and over the goal line in 1993, when Bolivia inflicted a famous 2-0 defeat on the team that would go on to win the World Cup 12 months later.

Bolivia qualified for the World Cup finals in the USA in 1994 but has not been able to fight its way back to that stage since. Tonight, in the unusual surroundings of El Alto, a new journey to change that begins.

(Top photo: Aizar Raldes/AFP via Getty Images)