Ecuador coach Gustavo Quinteros is delighted with Antonio Valencia\u2019s form for Manchester United. The 31-year-old right-wingback played just 857 minutes in the 2015\/16 Premier League under Louis van Gaal, but has been a first-choice starter under Jose Mourinho and is enjoying arguably his best season since dazzling for Wigan Athletic in 2008\/09.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cHe\u2019s been brilliant,\u201d said Quinteros of Valencia. \u201cHe\u2019s done really well throughout the season. He\u2019s been playing regularly and that gives confidence.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nQuinteros also weighed in on the situation of another Valencia, Enner. The 27-year-old forward went on loan to Everton from West Ham United in August in an attempt to get more playing time.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cEnner is [slowly] breaking into the team,\u201d said the former Bolivia defender, who did an admirable marking job on Germany\u2019s Karl-Heinz Riedle at USA 1994. \u201cHe has to try and make a place his own.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nAntonio Valencia scored a fine goal to put Ecuador en route to a 3-0 victory over Chile in 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia\u2122 qualifying in October. Enner Valencia has hit 19 goals in just 34 internationals. <\/p>\n
Ecuador are third in the South American standings, above Chile on goal difference, Argentina by a point and sixth-placed Colombia by two points. La Tricolor <\/em>had never qualified for the World Cup until 2002, but have now competed in three of the last four editions.<\/p>\n \nTheir best showing came at Germany 2006 when Carlos Tenorio and Agustin \u2018Tin\u2019 Delgado inspired a 2-0 win over Poland and a 3-0 reverse of Costa Rica that sent Ecuador into the knockout phase.\u00a0They were the heavy underdogs against an England side featuring David Beckham, Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Wayne Rooney in the Round of 16, but their strikers troubled John Terry and Rio Ferdinand throughout, with Tenorio hitting the crossbar. Ultimately, however, Luis Fernando Suarez\u2019s men were undone by a Beckham free-kick. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ecuador coach Gustavo Quinteros is delighted with Antonio Valencia\u2019s form for Manchester United. The 31-year-old right-wingback played just 857 minutes in the 2015\/16 Premier League under Louis van Gaal, but has been a first-choice starter under Jose Mourinho and is enjoying arguably his best season since dazzling for Wigan Athletic in 2008\/09. \u201cHe\u2019s been brilliant,\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[86],"class_list":["post-61578","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-football","tag-fifa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61578","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61578"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61578\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61578"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61578"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61578"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}