Young Chileans Look to Break Guinness World Record in Tocopilla

Tocopilla, birthplace of Barcelona star Alexis Sánchez, is aiming to have a new place in world football, with a group of youngsters aiming to break the Guinness World Record.

Starting on February 2 at 6 p.m. the group from the Poblacion Pacifico Norte aim to continue playing for 50 consecutive hours. The climatic conditions in the northern city are not ideal. Not only the desert heat will give the players trouble to continue in their match, by the heavily industrialised city is also highly polluted.

Barcelona star Sánchez has made a tradition of visiting the town each Christmas an playing the role of Santa. In 2013 he added to the gift list, personally assisting in the funding of playing fields for the town. The municipality responded by naming a street in his honour.

There is a bigger dream for Alexis though, saying at the opening of the new fields, “I’d like to see Tocopilla have a team in the Primera Division, but we’re going to need more help for that.”

Local businesses have chipped in to ensure the presence of a Guinness overseer who will make sure everything is conducted according to the rules. The effort is led by coach Iván Vicencio for the Pacifico Norte club. The new playing fields were launched midway through 2013.

Sánchez opened the scoring for Barcelona in their surprise loss to Valencia. The Tocopilla product was named as the best player for the Catalans, while Eduardo Vargas came off the bench in his debut for Valencia. In another clash of Chileans, Mauricio Pinilla scored the only goal in Cagliari’s victory over Fiorentina, with Matías Fernández and David Pizarro both seeing game time.

Chile coach Jorge Sampaoli will arrive in Europe on Thursday to see Chile’s players in action, as well as hold meetings with those he plans to take to Brazil. He will remain on the “Old Continent” until La Roja take on Germany in Stuttgart on March 5.

Tags: Chile, Guinness World Record, Tocopilla