Mexico and US clashed for the first time with Cocca as coach
The Arizona State Farm Stadium saw another edition of the CONCACAF Clasico, as Diego Cocca’s national team faced their eternal rival for the first time with the Argentinian as coach. This time around, despite it being a friendly, Mexico was looking to make up for all the defeats the Americans inflicted last year in two finals, in both the Nations League and the Gold Cup.
The least important thing in this type of thing is always the result, which ended up in a 1-1 draw. The most important thing is for the players to get used to the coach’s idea of play, to understand each other better inside the field, and for those who got their first game in the national team–such as forwards Roberto de la Rosa and Ozziel Herrera from Pachuca and Atlas respectively– to get a feel of what is like to wear the green shirt, specially against the US.
The game itself was reminiscent of the old days of Landon Donovan, where Mexico would press, get the ball possession, and have the clearest chances; but after a deadly counter, the Americans would end up scoring in one of the very few goal attempts they had.
Mexico played better in the first half, after Acevedo solved an attempt by the Americans early in the game, the team started getting the ball and feeling confident with it.The best players for El Tri were Chavez, Vega and Araujo. The best chance for Mexico came in at the 20th minute, a play between Vega and Chavez in the middle of the field, just outside the box ended up with a shot by Chavez that was off by mere centimetres from the left post. Another great play came just before the end of the first half, after an impressive play by Vega that Araujo couldn’t control properly inside the box.
Second Half
For the second half, the US came in playing better and immediately were able to reach the box, but the attack was unfruitful. While the first half was rather muddy and played mostly in the midfield, the second half was more of a back and forth deal for both teams. Such was the case when the US came in from the right at the 54th minute and looking for better options Kellyn Acosta sent the ball back to the midfield towards defender Aaron Long. Antuna was quick to read the pass and even quicker to strip the ball off the defender. The roadrunner from Chivas kept sprinting towards the ball as he had left all defenders behind and with a clinical right, still delivered at top speed, he put the ball next to the left post, far away from goalkeeper Sean Johnson, and into the net.
Mexico kept trying, with Chavez still commanding the attack. A series of close calls came in succession around the 80th minute, specially a beautiful play between Antuna–who yet again sprant from the right and served correctly– and de la Rosa that Charly Rodriguez could not finish as the ball ended on the cross bar. Immediately after this play, Sergino Dest took the rebound from the US defender, dribbled past four Mexican players, passed the ball to Alan Sonora who immediately touched correctly to Jordan Morris who would serve a beautiful cross to Jesus Ferreira and he himself would net the ball.
A deja vu from yesteryears where Landon Donovan, Clint Dempsey, et.al. would deliver clinical counter attacks with maximum speed and maximum efficiency. A beautiful goal by the Americans that unfortunately came after a beautiful play by the Mexicans who couldn’t finish.
Despite calls for a penalty on Ozziel Herrera near stoppage, the game ended without any other eventualities. Despite the let down, the team did show a substantial improvement over the matches against Surinam and Jamaica, particularly considering the higher quality of the Americans, who presented some of their stars yesterday such as Milan’s Dest. The next match against the CONCACAF rivals will be for the semifinals of the Nations League on June 15.
