Mexico faces growing soccer crisis ahead of USMNT clash

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Mexico faces growing soccer crisis ahead of USMNT clash

AUSTIN, Texas — On one side of the U.S.-Mexico rivalry, Mauricio Pochettino was beaming. Adulation spread across the field Saturday after 2-0 victory against Panama. Fans chanted Pochettino’s nameand a banner bearing his face summed up the consensus mood around the United States men’s national team: “BELIEVE.”

On the other side, in Puebla, Mexico, boos rained down.

They rained out for the fifth time in six games, following a 2-2 draw against Spanish club Valencia, in a friendly that should have provided a pressure-free environment to build on. But of course that doesn’t exist in Mexican football. And so, as the USMNT heads south to meet its rival for the 78th time on Tuesday (10:30 p.m. ET, TNT), the atmosphere around Sorting is full of discontent and unease.

To calm him down, in July, Mexico fired Jaime Lozano and hired their fourth coach in less than two years, Javier Aguirre.

Aguirre, in his early days, spoke of his desire “to give the fans what they’re looking for” and to “make sure that all fans leave satisfied with what they see.”

But at the end of his second match, a 0-0 draw against Canada in a two-thirds empty AT&T Stadium in Texas, the frustration returned.

And a month later, after Saturday’s draw against a Valencia B team, fatalism set in.

“Neither (Aguirre) nor anyone else has a ‘magic wand’ to end the football crisis,” said popular TUDN pundit David Faitelson. written the.

Miguel Layun, former national team fullback called for a questioning of “everything” in Mexican football, starting with the development processes. “We need to do some introspection, a very deep analysis and start correcting from the bottom up, even if it costs us the 2026 World Cup,” Layun said.

In many ways, the recurring protests have been counterproductive. In the past, this has hindered continuity and collective growth. Today, however, at least some sections of the Mexican soccer establishment are searching for and reckoning with the root cause of their pain.

The cause, of course, is not the senior national team’s training. Tata Martino, the first of four recent managers, did not start Mexico eliminated from their group for the 2022 World Cup. Neither he, nor Lozano, nor any of the 18 men who trained Sorting in the 21st century could elevate this current crop of Mexican players to soccer’s elite.

These actors, and the systems that shaped them, seem to be the problem. There has long been an incongruity between expectations and reality of the Mexican player pool, but it has become particularly pronounced in recent years. In 2018, Mexico could field a starting XI drawn primarily from clubs in Europe’s big five leagues or the Champions League. In 2024, only three of the current 27 players are playing at this level; 19 out of 27 play in Liga MX.

This is not a blow to the Mexican league, which remains the pinnacle of North American club football. Nor is this an attack on any of these 27 people; When they put on the green jersey of the national team, they almost always fight like hell for the badge, for each other and for their country.

But they are not good enough. They did not grow up like their predecessors. Liga MX clubs are reluctant to transfer them and eager to pay them – which keeps them at home, away from the precious discomfort of the European Tour, and probably slows down their personal progressjust like staying in MLS would do for an American player in his twenties.

There are likely many other reasons for declining quality – most debatable, some diagnosed, others less clear. The reality is that the current Mexican national team is…relatively ordinary.

Then Aguirre arrived, for the third time, to save Sorting of a crisis. He was on the field, as a player, when Mexico last won a World Cup knockout match (in 1986). Shortly after retiring, he became a coach and managed 10 different clubs and three different national teams: Japan, Egypt and his native Mexico.

In his first two stints in charge of Mexico, in 2001 and 2009, Aguirre launched World Cup qualifying cycles that were shaky. However, when he returned to duty in August – this time with former player Rafa Márquez as his assistant – he noted that this third assignment was a very different task.

“There is a project that is not just about saving three World Cup qualifiers,” Aguirre said. He celebrated the long-term vision of the Mexican football federation. There are no qualifiers, only friendly and regional tournaments; and “enough time to build a good team” by the 2026 World Cup.

Of course, this was also the company’s policy before the Copa América 2024. By omitting veterans and selecting an experimental roster, sporting director Duilio Davino said: “We want to take advantage of this great opportunity to not think about the immediacy of the result and project our path until 2026.”

Then they reacted to the result, a exit from group stageand fired Lozano – because the pressure cooker never gives way.

So here they are again, with inevitable discontent. Aguirre and the players say they understand that.

“The criticism comes from the fact that the team is not playing well,” Aguirre admitted Monday. “People have the right to express their discontent.”

“We know that playing in Mexico is like that,” defender Jesús Orozco Chiquete said on Saturday. “(The fans) are demanding and want results.”

And they surely know that the criticism will skyrocket if they don’t win on Tuesday in Guadalajara, against a USMNT is missing Christian Pulisic and Weston McKennie and seven other regulars. Americans would call a loss understandable; in Mexico, on the other hand, a loss would only raise alarm bells.

“To be part of the (Mexican) national team, you have to be ready for pressure,” longtime midfielder Andrés Guardado said Monday. “You have to be prepared to face this type of responsibility.”

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