'Don’t end on a miss': Rubin carries Maradona lesson, Guatemala’s World Cup hopes

Guatemala striker Rubio Rubin has had coaches with resumes that read like football royalty: Diego Maradona, Jürgen Klinsmann, Olympic gold medallist Luis Fernando Tena, and Champions League semi-finalist Erik ten Hag.

Yet amid all that grandeur, it's a small moment during a finishing drill that continues to define the 29-year-old's mindset today.

"The one thing that stuck with me was when we were doing a finishing drill," Rubin, during an interview with FIFA, recalled of his teenage days at Dorados de Sinaloa in Mexico, where Maradona was then manager.

"I had missed my final shot and started walking away because it was the end of training. He looked at me and said, 'Hey, where are you going?'

"I told him I was done. He said, 'You don't end on a miss, always on a goal.' So I went back, finished my next one, and then he said, 'Ok, now you can go.'"

That small interaction left a lasting impression.

"It stuck with me for the rest of my life. If I ever do a finishing drill or even just train alone, I always end on a positive note."

Rubin added that Maradona's love for the game was impossible to miss. "He always had a positive outlook on soccer and life.

"Just being able to share the field with him was incredible. He couldn't move much anymore, but there were times when he'd be out on the pitch by himself, juggling the ball like it was nothing.

"That's how much he loved the game. Even though he couldn't move, the ball never stopped bouncing on his feet."

Born in Oregon and raised through the US system, Rubin played for the Stars and Stripes at the FIFA U-20 World Cup New Zealand 2015 and earned senior appearances under Klinsmann.

But in 2022, with his career at a crossroads and a deeper connection to his roots, he made the switch to his mother's homeland of Guatemala -- a move that's proven transformative, both for him and for Los Chapines.

Now with Charleston Battery in the USL Championship, Rubin has become the face of a resurgent Guatemalan side that reached the semi-finals of the 2025 Concacaf Gold Cup -- their best finish since 1996.

They now stand two home games away from potentially qualifying for their first-ever FIFA World Cup.

When asked how it would feel to achieve that, Rubin replied, "My team-mates and I talk about it all the time.

"We play back-to-back home games at the end of qualifying in November, and some of the guys said we wouldn't be able to leave the stadium until the next day if we made it. It would be that crazy. They'd probably take us somewhere to celebrate.

"These are the things you dream about."