Wilmer Cabrera had reached the pinnacle of the sport in his country. He twice represented Colombia in the FIFA World Cup and had 48 caps in nine years on the national team.
When he decided to move to the United States, he had a set of goals in mind. And just four years later, Cabrera is the new U.S. under-17 national team coach, it was announced Thursday by U.S. Soccer Federation president Sunil Gulati.
"Since I moved to this country, I moved with my goals," he said in a conference call Friday with reporters. "First, learn English, study English and try to share my experience as a World Cup player with the kids and players over here. That my was goal, the first objective that moved me to this country."
Cabrera replaces John Hackworth, who was named to Bob Bradley's staff Wednesday.
"I'm really thrilled, happy and honored to receive this responsibility," Cabrera said. "I receive this responsibility knowing that I have the background, the experience, the knowledge to do it well, to represent this country, the United States, as best as possible."
Even though Cabrera has been in the USA for a relatively short time, he's immersed himself fully in youth soccer. In that time, he's not only learned the language, but he's earned his USSF "A" coaching license and has been a part of the U.S. under-18 men's national team coaching staff since January 2007.
He's shot up the ladder, but it's not a surprise to those who have worked with him.
"I've seen him take kids who have limitations and change the makeup," said Ben Boehm, the longtime youth director at famed New York-based club Blau-Weiss Gottschee. "He's going to do that at the national level. I just wish we had more high quality coaches at this level. If you're looking at coaches in the last 40 years, I would have to rank him in the top five."
And that Cabrera, who also coached the under-18 team at Gottschee, has become the first Hispanic national coach in U.S. Soccer shows that there is a concerted effort to reach out to a community that has felt ignored on the national level.
"I think it is a positive step forward for the soccer federation and for the sport when we've got someone like Wilmer, a Latino, who is in a position to impact the game on a high level," Gulati said. "He's earned that right. I think it's overdue from our perspective ... I think it's another important step along the way."
Cabrera has served as an ambassador to the Latino soccer community since being named the Manager of Fan Development for Major League Soccer. He served as the spokesman for MLS Futbolito and Verano MLS, two programs aimed at grassroots development.
Despite his background, including an 18-year playing career that saw stints in Colombia, Argentina and Costa Rica, highlighted by eight years with Colombia's America de Cali, Cabrera isn't just looking to add some Latin flair on the U-17 team.
"For me, as a coach, I'm looking for good players, great players and players that satisfy what I want on the field," he said. "If they're good, they have to be able to play with him and I will open the door no matter what.
"We're going to talk the most important language and that's the language of soccer," Cabrera added. "And if on the field they're speaking that language, we're going to understand each other and we're going to move with the same ideas the whole time."
Cabrera, who currently resides on Long Island, N.Y., will move to Bradenton, Fla. to oversee U.S. Soccer's U-17 residency program, where 40 of the country's elite players reside year-round.
"They need to learn that the sport that they are playing right now, it's their sport," Cabrera said. "It's not the coach's sport. With that goal I hope they can express themselves on the field and give their best for them, for the country they are representing and also to try and be a winner."
As coach of the U-17 team, Cabrera will be responsible both for the development of future full national team players and getting results, as well. After all, the U.S. U-17 team is the only team in the world to qualify for every World Cup at that age level, earning one fourth-place and two fifth-place finishes in five World Cup cycles since the launch of the under-17 residency program in 1999.
And while players like Landon Donovan, DaMarcus Beasley, Oguchi Onyewu, Bobby Convey and Eddie Johnson have graduated from the program to play in the 2006 FIFA World Cup, Cabrera said the pressure is nothing like it was when he was a young player in Colombia.
"It's a huge difference," he said. "When I started to play soccer, for me that was the only option to try to change my family life, just to survive. That is not the case in the United States. You don't have to play soccer to survive, to try and make a good living."
Dylan Butler is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
