Mexico City. In September 2019, Javier Aguirre watched Mexico’s last victory over the United States from afar (3-0 in a friendly in New Jersey). After being dismissed from the Egyptian national team, he was on vacation. He never imagined that, in the next seven games, El Tri would lose the dominance they had built in the Concacaf classic.
In World Cup qualifiers, Gold Cup finals and the Nations League, the Americans defeated the Mexican representative more than once. Aguirre also remembers another precedent: the round of 16 in Korea-Japan 2002, when the Stars and Stripes team beat his team 2-0 at the Jeonju stadium.
“It was the worst defeat of my career,” he admits a few hours before the meeting agreed at the Akron stadium, home of Guadalajara. “I have cried twice in football, once out of sadness and once out of joy. “That was the scariest night.”
The draws at the Azteca stadium (0-0) and the University of Phoenix (1-1), in the qualification for the Qatar World Cup and last year’s friendly, mark the only defense of the Tri during the negative streak against its rival from north.
“I want to see who, before the whistle of the fans themselves, has the guts to be in the national team,” he warns. “It’s very nice to be applauded and asked for your autographs, but you can also see the player when people show their discontent. That one is okay. On the other hand, anyone who hides or wants the game to be over is of no use to me.”
The United States enters this duel with the absences of Christian Pulisic (AC Milan), Weston McKennie (Juventus), Marlon Fossey (Liege), Ricardo Pepi (PSV) and Zack Steffen (Colorado Rapids). Despite this, Argentine coach Mauricio Pochettino takes things calmly. “The processes must also have a little calm,” he points out about the current situation facing the Tricolor.
“I get the feeling that in Mexico the results must have been for yesterday, not for tomorrow. “You have to understand that it is not the final of the World Cup.”
No impositions
Tickets to attend the stadium this Tuesday have been sold out since the end of August, authorities reported. Vasco changes the tone of the conversation when he is questioned about an alleged imposition of selected players on his squad, described in a television program by Brazilian Ricardo Tuca Ferretti. “Never in my life has anyone, other than my coaching staff, dared to even make a pass at me about a player,” he says. “The only thing I have is this, it is my heritage. I have done and undone with my decisions, my convictions. If anyone wants to prove it, let them prove it.”
The match will serve as a tribute to the five-time World Cup winner Andrés Guardado, who will play a match with the Tricolor for the last time.
“To be in the national team you have to be prepared for the pressure. I wanted to transmit that to the younger ones. It is not easy to put on this shirt, but it is also a privilege, it is not a suffering,” says the so-called Little Prince, invited by Aguirre to be part of your coaching staff in the future
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