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Mexico usually hits a wall when playing on the opening day of a World Cup.
Of the seven previous occurrences, Tri’s balance is five defeats and two draws. Mexico will have another opportunity on Thursday when it hosts South Africa to begin the 48-team tournament.
“We have to break that trend,” coach Javier Aguirre said at a news conference Wednesday at the Azteca stadium.
“I didn’t know anything about that,” he said of the winless sequence, “but I’ll mention it to the guys. It’s a good reason to tell them we have to go out and win the game. Hopefully we break that trend tomorrow.”
Thursday’s match is a rematch of the opening match of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. That match ended in a 1-1 draw in Johannesburg.
Aguirre, who is in his third stint as Mexico coach, has the team playing its best football in years and riding a seven-match unbeaten streak. El Tri’s last defeat was against Paraguay in November.
“It could be a great day for us; whatever happens, it will be a celebration that will last for decades,” said Aguirre, who played for Mexico in the 1986 World Cup on home soil, when the Mexican team did not play in the first game of the tournament but did reach the quarterfinals.
“I hope we start on the right foot, like we did then,” he added. “The players know it: tomorrow could be a historic day for many of them, since it is unlikely that they will experience a World Cup at home again.”
Mexico lost its opening matches in 1930, 1950, 1954, 1958 and 1962 and tied in 1970 (at home) and 2010.
(Photo by PEDRO UGARTE/AFP via Getty Images)
In some of those tournaments the matches began simultaneously on the opening day, such as in Uruguay in 1930, when France beat Mexico 4-1, while the United States defeated Belgium 3-0.
In the 1986 World Cup, defending champion Italy played the first match of the tournament against Bulgaria: a 1-1 draw in Mexico City. The Mexican team played its first game of the group stage two days later and beat Belgium 2-1.
old rivals
(Photo by Carl de Souza and Phill Magakoe/AFP via Getty Images)
Aguirre and Hugo Broos, former Belgian international and now South Africa coach, faced each other that day.
“I vividly remember the confidence with which we took the field to face Belgium. We were certain that the match would not go wrong; we understood the challenge that Belgium posed and the South Africa coach, who played in that match, learned from that experience,” Aguirre added.
Broos, appointed in May 2021, leads South Africa to their first FIFA World Cup in 16 years and also achieved a third-place finish at the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations.
“It is certainly a big challenge to play in front of 87,000 Mexicans, but I will tell the players to concentrate on the game. The Mexican (fans) in the stadium don’t play, they just shout, sing and dance,” Broos said. “We have to focus on the game (and) if we can do that and not worry about the noise from the Mexicans, we can have a good game tomorrow.”
After losing to Mexico in 1986, Broos and Belgium bounced back to reach the semifinals. Mexico lost to Germany on penalty kicks in the round of 16.
“We don’t have the pressure that belongs to the host,” Broos said. “We are very well prepared for tomorrow’s game.”
Information from The Associated Press.
