Julio Enciso picks up the tablet, presses play and watches intently. On screen, a younger Enciso talks about representing Paraguay at youth level. He recalls what it meant to wear the national colours and praises the facilities and staff the Paraguayan Football Association (APF) provided to help him grow as a player.

“I must have been about 15 there, right?” asks the now 22-year-old international forward with a smile. Published in June 2020, the video highlights the modernisation of CARDE (the Albiroga technical centre in Ypané, Paraguay), an infrastructure project completed by the APF with support from the FIFA Forward Programme.

“That’s wonderful!” he exclaims as the footage brings the memories flooding back. “It’s really emotional because it shows how much work I was putting in, not least with the national team, and what it meant to me then… and what it means to me now. This is where every player wants to be,” says Enciso, one of the leading lights of the current Paraguay side.

Nicknamed “La Joya” (The Jewel), the Ipswich Town forward came through the APF’s national-team pathway, which has helped the Albirroja return to the FIFA World Cup™ after a 16-year absence. Enciso is quick to recognise the pathway’s importance. “They have made our lives easier as players by giving us the tools we need to fulfil our dreams. And, of course, fulfilling those dreams also helps the national team succeed.”

APF President Robert Harrison recently held Enciso up as an example of the association's wide-ranging development work with FIFA, which has seen it invest in infrastructure through FIFA Forward and help create a player pathway by taking part in the FIFA Talent Development Scheme (TDS).

“In that FIFA article about the renovation of CARDE, Julio appears as a boy playing for our U-15 national team, already dreaming of becoming a professional footballer. Years later, we saw him reach the world’s top leagues and, in 2026, represent Paraguay at his first FIFA World Cup. For me, that is what all this work is about,” said Harrison.

The new FIFA U-15 World Cup & Festival 2026™ is designed to strengthen that very pathway through the youth national teams. Paraguay will be among the sides competing in Azerbaijan this October. “I’d have loved to play in a tournament like that. Tournaments like these play a huge part in a player’s development,” Enciso said. “The stakes are higher because everyone is watching – clubs, the senior national-team coach… It’s a positive kind of pressure, one that takes you closer to your dream.”

In June 2021, aged 17 years, one month and 18 days, Enciso became the fourth-youngest player to make his senior debut for Paraguay. Now that the FIFA U-17 World Cup™ is held every year, Enciso believes players can arrive better prepared for that step up. “A player never stops learning, especially at that age. When tournaments like these are held regularly, players can develop in the best possible way and gain valuable experience.”

Enciso is proud to have witnessed, and played his part in, the national team’s resurgence, with World Cup qualification providing “the reward for so much hard work”. But he is hungry for more. “I want Paraguay to always be up there among the best and to be respected as such. This is the path we must follow: we have to keep improving in every area.”

Since joining the Paraguay national team set-up, in addition to the CARDE project, Enciso has seen two other major APF infrastructure projects supported by FIFA’s Forward Programme come to fruition: the CARFEM (Centro de Alto Rendimiento de Fútbol Femenino) in 2022 and the CARDIF (Centro de Alto Rendimiento de las Divisiones Formativas) in 2004.

With that in mind, he has this advice for the next generation: “Make the most of everything that has been built and the top-class facilities available to you. Learn from all the professionals around you and listen to every coach, because you are the future of the national team.”

Enciso, who scored in the 1-1 draw with Germany in the round of 32 at this year's FIFA World Cup before Paraguay went through on penalties, now knows what it means to play on the game's biggest stage. “It’s the highest level a player can reach with his country.”

Even so, he is keeping his emotions in check when discussing Paraguay’s role in hosting one of the centenary celebration matches in 2030. “It’s a dream… I don’t want to look too far ahead because there is so much football to be played between now and then. We have to prepare as well as possible so that we’re ready for the occasion, and that is exactly what we intend to do.”

That has not stopped him from imagining what hosting a World Cup could mean for Paraguayan football. “The impact would be incredible… For everyone, the officials and us as players, it would be further proof that we are on the right path. And that, at the highest level, you can never stop improving.”