El Tri Is Back In Action
The long-awaited return of the Mexican National Team will be in full force this upcoming summer as they have various games lined up in preparation for three upcoming tournaments: Concacaf Nations League Finals, Tokyo Olympics and the CONCACAF Gold Cup. Gerardo “Tata” Martino’s team will start first on May 29th, 2021, in a match against the national team of Iceland at ATT Stadium in Arlington, Texas. Fans will be allowed in the stadium as the state of Texas is one of those few that are quickly undoing previous Covid-19 restrictions.
That friendly matchup against Iceland will be in preparation for the semi-final match against Costa Rica in the Concacaf Nations League Finals on June 3rd. This will be the determining factor for Mexico advancing to either the final stage of the tournament or playing for the third-place position on June 6th, both games taking place on the same day. It should be noted, Martino will have a large group of players, 31, to be able to choose from. For these games, “Tata” called up a mixture of Liga MX, MLS and European players.
The biggest surprise among them is the return of Raul Jimenez who is coming off a horrendous head injury that left the Mexican striker without any playing activity since November of 2020. Another surprise of the recent call up is the absence of the national team’s top scorer, Javier Hernandez. Hernandez, who currently has more goals (7) than Alan Pulido (3) and Rodolfo Pizarro (0) in the MLS, has been questioned on his absence which will continue to be a hot topic as long as “Chicharito” continues scoring big for the LA Galaxy.
“El Tri” will also have a few matchups prior to the start of the 2021 Gold Cup. First they will face Honduras on June 12th and a few weeks later, on June 30th, will face off against Panama. These games should yield various opportunities for the 31 players that were called up for international duty. With these preparation games as well as the tournaments themselves, let’s brace ourselves, because the MexTour is in full affect!!
