How Mexicans no longer loved their national team

With 2-for-1 tickets and free entry for everyone who had the physical ticket for Mexico's last game at the Estadio Cuauhtémoc in 2007, the Mexican national team is preparing to face La Liga side Valencia in a friendly on Saturday evening received.

The Mexican soccer federation is doing everything it can to avoid the stands in Puebla, Mexico, resembling the scene of El Tri's last two games in Los Angeles and Dallas. Two places where El Tri usually feels at home have been abandoned by their fans, painting a brutally honest picture of the sporting crisis that has plagued the Mexican national team since the start of the decade.

Mexico was once the undisputed king of CONCACAF, with traveling fans filling the largest stadiums in North America and the world. Now this deeply football-loving country has fallen out of love with a national team that has consistently given them nothing but defeats and embarrassing eliminations in the biggest international competitions.

Dominance in the region is a thing of the past, with Mexico remaining winless in their last seven meetings against the USMNT. At the 2022 World Cup, El Tri failed to make it past the group stage for the first time in 44 years. Last summer's Copa América was a chance to restore some credibility to the national team; However, Mexico scored one goal in three games and was again eliminated in the group stage of a major international tournament.

It feels like a lifetime ago when Hirving Lozano fired a shot past Manuel Neuer to score the winning goal against reigning champions Germany in the opening game of the 2018 World Cup. What has happened since then is a frustratingly high number of poor decisions that have left El Tri in shambles and lethargic heading into a World Cup it will co-host in less than two years.

The reasons are varied and start at the top. Liga MX owners have abolished relegation and promotion in the league in 2020, meaning players and teams no longer feel the pressure to perform every week to avoid finishing last in the table. The owners, together with the football association, also decided to no longer participate in the continental Copa Libertadores in 2016, forgoing the chance to continue playing against South America's biggest teams. The decision not to send the national team to the Copa América from 2016 until its return to competition this year caused even more confusion.

Join SI Soccer's Mexico National Team WhatsApp community – get all the latest news and analysis straight to your phone

Decisions like these have caused Liga MX to stagnate. Yes, financially the clubs have continued to grow, but that has also partly led to another problem: young and exciting Mexican players are usually sold within Liga MX and not sent to Europe. Instead of following the example of MLS and most South American leagues, Liga MX clubs charge significant fees to sell their young talent. Former Mexico coach Gerardo “Tata” Martino said Mexican players don't go to Europe because teams won't let them.

“The fees they charge for them (players) are exorbitant,” Martino said. Mexican winger Uriel Antuna has been recruited by European clubs who were reportedly willing to pay $3.5 million for the player. Cruz Azul wanted double that, and last summer Liga MX side Tigres reportedly paid around $8 million for Antuna, keeping him in Liga MX for the foreseeable future.

The lack of ambition at home also affects the players. Young players of the Mexican national team feel comfortable in Liga MX, where they are paid better and have security in terms of playing time compared to Europe. Both clubs and players are responsible for the fact that fewer and fewer Mexican talents are competing among Europe's elite.

The consequence? Mexico is struggling to replace the older generation of players who led the team at the 2014 and 2018 World Cups. Fans have been wanting a generational change for some time, and former coach Jaime Lozano honored that wish by leaving players like Guillermo Ochoa, Hirving Lozano and Raúl Jiménez out of the Copa América squad. This made it clear that the new generation of players is not as competitive as their predecessors, at least for now. Mexico can't force a generational change if the older players it's trying to replace are still better than the new arrivals.

Javier Aguirre is back as El Tri manager for the third time and is once again looking to help a team in need. He is Mexico's fourth coach in less than two years and has the big task ahead of him of overcoming the challenges that his predecessors failed to meet.

Unfortunately, he also has to deal with abandoning a previously patient fan base that has had enough.

READ THE LATEST LIGA MX NEWS, PREVIEWS, PREDICTIONS, TRANSFER RUMORS AND MORE