Seemingly every kid in San Juan Bautista, a whispery, pastoral town in southern Paraguay, grew up dreaming of becoming a footballer. Everyone, that is, expect Gustavo Raul Gomez Portillo. Sure, he enjoyed a kickabout with his friends, but the bullseye on which he fixated was becoming a lawyer. At 14, he began doing work experience in a prosecutor’s office. He enjoyed overhearing legal dialogue as he made photocopies and served coffee. He loved it when, now and again, he was asked to aid investigative proceedings. Two years later he begrudgingly gave it up. His hobby – something he engaged in on an afternoon, between a full morning at the office and an evening of study – had turned into his foremost potential profession. It was indebted to an invite – yet not one to go and represent his local football club in a tournament in the capital Asuncion, or a national youth team somewhere across the Americas. It was to South Africa, issued from nobody less than senior Paraguay coach Tata Martino, to go to a FIFA World Cup™. Gomez was being taken there to help out in training sessions and because the shot-callers were convinced he would be cornerstone of future Albirroja sides at the global finals.