Natalia Málaga (PER) |
 At the World Cup in '91, Natalia brought team leadership to the team. Unfortunately, all her yelling and pumping couldn't give Peru its Olympic qualification. In Peru we describe a team member who is energetic and persistent as “the little motor” or “little heart” of the team, which in the USA would best translate as “the Energizer bunny”. Natalia Málaga was precisely that for the Peruvian team. When she played, there wasn’t a rally that would end in a flat, dropped ball, for she would always try to save it regardless of how unreachable it was. She wasn’t tall at all, in fact, she was the shortest of all the starters. I think she and Denisse were both under 1.76 metres tall, but the difference between her and Denisse was that Natalia was built, fit, with broad shoulders, and on a diet that was definitely not based on candy. Good nutrition gave her strong bones that I never recall seeing injured (until January 2000). And if she ever was hurt, she downplayed it very well, not giving anybody any advantage. Natalia is so fit that it wouldn’t be surprising if even if in her late 30s she continues playing beach volleyball, a sport in which athletic fitness is even more demanding.
A year later, at the ’87 Japan Cup the circumstances were such that Natalia benefitted from them: Cecilia went to play in Italy but then was sidelined with a serious knee injury. Therefore, Sonia Heredia had to replace Cecilia which (I think) came for Natalia as a blessing. Without the strong personality that Cecilia used to bounce around the court, Natalia felt much more at ease, and it certainly showed in her play. Whatever she did well at the ’86 World’s she was doing much better at the Japan Cup. She was covering hits that seemed to be blocked straight down, she was even pounding cross-court attacks even with two blockers up! Not to take merit away from Cecilia’s play or the confidence that she brought to the team as the go-to hitter, but it was so obvious that in ’87 the six of them played at an even level: Denisse, Rosa, Sonia, Gaby, Gina, and Natalia, played phenomenal volleyball. And it paid off. Peru took home the Cup, and with that sent a message to the world that they would seriously challenge at the Olympics. 
But Seoul was a mixed bag insofar as
results and individual levels concerned. Fortunately for Peruvian
volleyball, Cecilia Tait returned but with a knee brace, however, she
was fully mobile and it did not hinder her usual grace and style, though
it was clear she was not at he best level. But it didn’t matter,
because what Cecilia lost in offensive firepower, Gaby more than made up
with hers. The rest of the team was playing really well, with only one
exception: Natalia. Initially, coach Man Bok Park (Mambo) put her in the
starting lineup against China. But apparently, during one of his
time-outs he ordered something and Natalia chipped back at him. She
hadn't even blinked before she realized that she was in big trouble:
Mambo sat her down for the rest of the match. She must've forgotten that
no one answers back at Mambo like that—ever. Out of her own hubris
Natalia saw limited playing time. Cenaida Uribe came in to replace her,
and she didn’t disappoint. Her performance against China was solid,
and against Japan stellar (some shanks notwithstanding) and it was clear
that Mambo relied on Cenaida’s offence more than on Natalia’s. But
Natalia had better ball control than Cenaida, so he inserted her to fine
tune the team. Unfortunately, the story ended with a 3-2 loss to the
Soviet Union, 17-15 in the fifth, and the whole Peruvian team feeling
miserable after having given their best shot.  At the '90 Goodwill Games in Seattle, Natalia sported a new look: a pony-tail. The ’91 World Cup was quite a disappointing moment for Natalia. The team had to beat the other non-qualified teams in order to go to the Barcelona Olympics, namely, the USA, South Korea, Canada, Germany, and Spain. All of the other participating teams present had been assured of their Olympic participation. For the six teams vying for a spot, however, the competition was all the more intense. If I recall well, Mambo had nominated Gaby as the team captain, since she had far become the team’s most valuable asset, adding to the fact that she had matured into a leader, somewhere between the quietness of Rosa and the loudness of Natalia. But neither Rosa nor Natalia cared, on the contrary, they fully supported their teammate in her new role. The other well-respected member of that team was Denisse, who was the oldest player and added her solid attack and experience to the team. The other two positions were filled with two players who hadn’t seen too much playing time in the past: Miriam Gallardo, a lefty who was good but very inconsistent; and Margarita Delgado, a young player who was a bit stiff and inexperienced, and as such, proved to be the weak link of the team. However, Natalia made sure to keep them confident in themselves, showering them with advice, directions, and pushing them to their limits. But maybe she spent so much time and energy helping the whole team keep a steady level, that she forgot about her own. At crucial points in the matches, she got stuff-blocked by either the Soviet or USAmerican players. And as Natalia and Denisse began to falter, the dependence on Gaby grew to be too much. In general, the team would get stuck when Gaby went to the back row, and the other teams exploited this to the max. In the final match for the sole remaining Olympic spot, the USA edged out Peru in a close five-set match, despite Gaby’s desperate last-minute efforts.  Natalia is about to serve one of her wicked flat spinners that would barely skid the net. She had the best serve on the Peruvian team. Natalia, Rosa, and Gaby continued their partnership until the South American Championship in Cusco in 1993. They beat Brazil in a 3-1 final that these three players took very personally, for ever since coming up short at the ’91 World Cup the word throughout Peru was that the glorious times were over and the players had grown old and weak. So they proved everyone wrong by winning yet another continental title, and with that statement, Gaby announced her retirement from the national team. Natalia and Rosa continued, though, never tiring and accompanying a totally new team to play at the ’94 Grand Prix, where they ended in penultimate place, just ahead of Chinese Taipei. Later that year at the World Championships in Brazil, Peru didn’t even make it out of its pool, eliminated by first-time competitor Azerbaidjan. The team was faltering. I managed to see them play live at the Goodwill Games in Saint Petersburg that very year and I could see that Natalia was the real coach of the team. When Mambo left, he appointed another Korean to replace him, Jun Dug Park, but due to language difficulties none of the players paid much attention to him, even less took him seriously. The real boss had become Natalia, who instructed the younger ones to show their best. But that didn’t happen. Frustrating as it must’ve been, Natalia stuck by them and by her country until 1995 when she and Rosa left the team. One would think this was the end of the story, but no…  The adult team sunk to its lowest after Natalia and Rosa left. Winless at the Atlanta Olympics (which they qualified to only because the FIVB decided to expand the number of participants—a change that came four years too late), failing to make the ’97 South American final (which was a huge disaster), and ninth at the ’98 World’s in Japan where they struggled against teams like the Dominican Republic and Kenya, Peru needed a change desperately. It was then that Mambo decided to return as head coach, and with him Natalia and Rosa, who were in their mid-thirties but had maintained themselves active in the sport (by playing a lot of beach volleyball). It was incredible that despite the nearly five year hiatus, Natalia kept on going! She continued to perform her role as the experienced one, and Rosa elevated everyone’s game with her unpredictable—but rusty—setting. They qualified in January 2000 for the Sydney Olympics in a five-set match against Argentina that had been too close for comfort. Natalia wasn’t a starter because of a wrist injury. But when Argentina went up 2-0 and the thought of not qualifying once again loomed in the horizon, Natalia signaled to Mambo to please let her play. In the third set, she came in, and despite her injured wrist made a couple of consecutive kills that put the team back on a confident course. After outmanoeuvering the Argentine in the next three sets, Peru qualified for Sydney. Natalia accompanied the team on a tour through Europe and Asia in June 2000, and she seems to be a starter once again on the lineup for the upcoming Olympics. Rosa is doing the same, in the hopes of restoring some of the team’s long-lost dignity. Still, the fact that both Natalia and Rosa keep on playing international volleyball even after a long and grueling two decades is simply astounding.
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