IT is often said that if you wear Newcastle United’s number nine shirt, you carry the hopes of an entire city on your shoulders.

For Salomon Rondon, however, a high weight of expectation is nothing new. From the moment he left his Venezuelan homeland at the age of 19, the softly-spoken striker has been the sporting figurehead of one of the most impoverished and ostracised countries in the world.

Venezuela, with its revolutionary socialist political regime led first by Hugo Chavez and now by Nicolas Maduro, is in a state of rapidly-escalating crisis. For most of the past decade, the inflation rate has been running at a figure in the thousands, and a recent study published by three Venezuelan universities concluded that 90 per cent of the country’s population now lives in poverty.

Violent crime is rife – having previously spoken of his fears for his family’s safety in their native Caracas, Rondon was understandably reluctant to discuss the subject when we met at Newcastle’s training ground – and food shortages have forced thousands of Venezuelans to flee the country in search of a new life overseas.

In such a harshly unforgiving environment, it is no surprise that the Venezuelan population turn to sport to provide light relief. Baseball and basketball might be the country’s two biggest sporting pursuits, but neither offers an opportunity to celebrate Venezuelan nationhood on the global stage. For that, Venezuela’s sport fans have to revel in Rondon’s achievements.

In a career that has taken him to Spain, Russia and now England, Rondon has proudly served up a Venezuelan narrative that is not premised around poverty and crime. He has given his compatriots something to believe in, and while it is not always feasible for him to return home, he remains fiercely loyal to those he left behind.

With that in mind, he is hardly going to be fazed by the supposed pressure of wearing a black-and-white number nine on his back. Whatever he does in his season-long loan spell, whatever he achieves or does not achieve on Tyneside, it will be nothing compared to the wider context of what he is accomplishing every time he walks on to the field.

“Everyone knows what the situation is in Venezuela,” said Rondon, who has already confirmed his desire to turn his current loan move into a permanent transfer next summer. “It is a difficult moment for the Venezuelan people.

“The only way or the only thing to make people happy, or to make the people forget the problems, is playing football. Every weekend, they try to watch the Premier League and La Liga. It is a distraction from the problems they have there.

“You read about the inflation all the time in the newspapers and it is very, very high. I am a footballer not an economist, but of course it is a bad situation for the people there and for me as well, for everyone, for all Venezuelan people around the world because we’ve got family there.

“It is a difficult moment – everyone knows what has happened – but my responsibility as a Venezuelan footballer is to make Venezuelan people proud of football.

“It’s the same when we play for the national team. We try to make them forget the bad moments, the bad things, just for those 90 minutes. I don’t have a tattoo, but if I did, it would be the flag of my country. I feel very, very proud to be Venezuelan. This is my ID. As a footballer, I try my best to make them proud.”

There has been plenty for Venezuelans to revel in so far. Having impressed as a teenager in the Venezuelan domestic league, Rondon started his career in Europe with Spanish side Las Palmas, then in the Segunda Division.

He moved on to Malaga, where he played under Manuel Pellegrini and finished as top scorer in two successive seasons as his side finished fourth in La Liga.

Big-money moves to Russian clubs Rubin Kazan and Zenit St Petersburg followed, and while he never quite managed to live up to his billing at West Brom, proving unable to prevent the Baggies suffering relegation last season, he has never lost faith in his ability.

As if to underline the point, he has penned the number nine on the flip-flops he wears at Newcastle’s training ground, highlighting his comfort as the Magpies’ main man.

“I like the pressure,” said Rondon, who discussed life in Newcastle with Faustino Asprilla prior to agreeing his loan deal this summer. “And yes, I know all about the number nine. When I signed the contract here, I looked around and there was a big picture of all the top scorers with Alan Shearer at the top with 206, so the pressure is big.

“It’s amazing to score 206 goals, but I also want to make the fans proud by wearing this shirt, like Alan Shearer did.”

Newcastle first declared their interest more than two months ago, but Rondon had to wait until the final week of the transfer window before his move was agreed.

As a result, he missed all bar one of West Brom’s pre-season matches, and Rafael Benitez did not feel he was ready to start last weekend’s opening-day game with Tottenham.

He still came within inches of making an immediate impact against Spurs, hitting the crossbar with a late shot that deflected off Jan Vertonghen, and with another week’s training under his belt, there is every chance he will make his first Newcastle start at Cardiff City this afternoon.

“It all feels very big,” he said. “Newcastle in the Premier League – I know all about the amazing South American players who have been here. (Nolberto) Solano, (Jonas) Gutierrez – they did really well here.

“In my career, I have played in different leagues with different players, and I know this is the biggest move of my career. That is why I want to stay here permanent.

“I feel lucky to have this chance. The situation when West Brom went down was difficult, and I am just really grateful to be back in the Premier League. There were lots of us at the game last weekend – my wife, my kids, my mother-in-law, the grandma of my wife, and it was an incredible experience.”