Where is Gustavo Dulanto?: He has been ‘disappeared’ for 9 months after making history against Real Madrid

Dulanto, 27, was trained in the minor divisions of the University of San Martín de Porres and also in the Rosario Central academy in Argentina, where he spent three years. He returned to Peru and made his professional soccer debut in 2015 with the Universitario de Deportes jersey, a club with which his father ‘Pocho’ Dulanto was a three-time champion. Then, in 2017, he landed at UTC and at the end of that year he signed with Real Garcilaso (now Cusco FC) to compete in the 2018 Copa Libertadores.

He remained in the Cusco team until mid-2019, since with the arrival of Juan Reynoso as coach he lost prominence and continuity. However, in July of that year he was announced as a player for Portugal’s Boavista. It was his first experience in a foreign team. There he alternated in the starting team and was able to score two goals. However, in February 2021 he decided to look for new horizons and signed for Sheriff Tiraspol from Moldova, an Eastern European country neighboring Ukraine.

His time at the Moldovan club

With Sheriff, Dulanto won the Moldova First Division tournament in the 2020-21 season, where he became one of the team’s benchmarks, being captain on a couple of occasions and scoring two goals during the campaign. In addition, being champion, the team entered the qualifying stage of the 2021-22 Champions League, where they would have to face four European clubs before qualifying for the group stage of the competition, and where they had an epic performance.

The Sheriff first beat Teuta from Albania 5-0 on aggregate. Subsequently, they defeated Alashkert from Armenia (4-1), Red Star from Serbia (2-1) and Dinamo Zagreb from Croatia (3-0). In this way, they advanced to the group round and became the first Moldovan team in history to reach that instance. The Tiraspol eleven was placed in Group D, along with Real Madrid, Inter Milan and Shakhtar Donetsk from Ukraine. The surprise of this quartet was precisely the Dulanto team, which achieved an unforgettable result after beating the Madrid team at the Bernabeu, although in the end it finished third in the standings.

The Moldovan club could not continue in the Champions League, but it did qualify for the preliminary round of the Europa League, where it collided with Sporting Braga from Portugal, a team with a long history in international competitions. Dulanto did not play the first match against Braga due to the accumulation of yellow cards, although he was in the return match. Both squads tied for a 2-2 aggregate and everything was decided on penalties, with victory in favor of the experienced Portuguese team. The Peruvian was captain in that match. Unfortunately, he was one of those who missed a penalty.

Although they did not advance further at the international level, the Sheriff was still the clear leader of the Moldovan league with the national defender as captain in many games. At the end of the season, the club won the two-time championship. However, for the following campaign, Dulanto did not continue. The Russian invasion of Ukraine increased tension in Moldova and particularly in Tiraspol, which has a large Russian presence, and Dulanto opted to seek new challenges, so he left the Sheriff and joined Latvian Riga FC.

Your actuality

With Riga FC, the Peruvian defender only played 8 games in mid-2022, as he injured his right knee at the end of August during a training session. He suffered a torn cruciate ligament that to this day keeps him away from official matches. Currently, he has not played an official match with his club for almost 9 months.

Dulanto continues to recover. The good thing is that he has already been able to go out on the pitch to do rehabilitation exercises. “And one day he left the gym and we went back to the field”, the central reported on his personal Instagram account. He hopes to get back on track soon.

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