Pervis Estupinan: Villarreal and Ecuador Left Back
Pervis Estupinan is an Ecuadorian professional footballer who plays as a left back for Spanish club Villarreal. At the age of 13, he joined the youth academy of Quito based club LDU Quito. He joined the first team of the club ahead of the 2015 Ecuador football season. His debut for the club came against El Nacional in a 1-0 home win for LDU Quito. He played a total of 45 games for LDU Quito.
In July 2016, Estupinan was a first team regular for the Ecuadorian Club. Premier League team Watford came calling. Estupinan signed for the Hornets in the same month. He was loaned out to Spanish club Granada for the 2016-17 season where he played 23 times but only 2 of them were for the first team. The remaining 21 matches came for the reserve team of the Andalusians. For the 2017-18 season, Estupinan was once again loaned out by parent club Watford. This time, he joined another Spanish club UD Almeria which competes in 2nd Division of Spanish football. He made 27 appearances for the team that season. After finishing the 17-18 season with Almeria, Estupinan joined RCD Mallorca for the 2018-19 season. He played 25 times for the team from Palma de Mallorca helping them achieve promotion to the LaLiga scoring 3 goals and giving 2 assists in the process.
After helping Mallorca achieve promotion, Estupinan went back to Watford. Again, he was loaned out to another Spanish club. This time, it was Osasuna which was also promoted to LaLiga alongside Mallorca. He enjoyed a fruitful campaign for the team from Pamplona scoring once and assisting 7 times in all competitions. After the 2019-20 season ended, Estupinan returned to Watford who got relegated to the EFL Championship after they finished in 19th position in the Premier League points table.
Ahead of the 2020-21 season, Estupinan finally left Watford having not made even a single appearance for the Hornets. He signed for LaLiga team Villarreal for a fee around €16.4 million. As of 3 Nov 2020, he has made 5 appearances for the Yellow Submarine.
Estupinan has a great attacking threat whilst displaying defensive solidity. He possesses incredible stamina and a great engine bombarding forward and tracking back down the left flank. In the 19-20 season, Osasuna’s attacks were primarily through the left wing. From this, we know that Estupinan was crucial to the team’s offensive tactics. He rarely cuts inside and mostly maintains his width. His positioning and movement, both with and without the ball are his biggest strengths. He is also very good in crossing, which is a prerequisite for a modern full back. He is also very direct in his attacking, often running at defenders. Estupinan finished in the top 10 in the number of dribbles category despite being a full back.
Estupinan’s weaknesses are his lack of top flight experience. Before joining Osasuna for the 19-20 season, he played just two top flight matches after joining Europe from LDU Quito. He lost possession over 13 times a game. Sometimes, his poor decision making lets his team’s defence down. A bad pass from him often lead to gaps opening up and the opposition attackers exploited those gaps several times.
Despite his weaknesses, he is only 22 years of age and with time on his side, he will iron out those weaknesses. A few more good seasons at Villarreal will see the Ecuadorian youngster’s market value rise and be monitored by bigger clubs in Europe that will vie for his services.
