Mexico once again opened the door to the world with a ball. Once again he made global that of “my house, his house”; No other country in the history of the great football event has been able to verbalize it so many times, three already. The same ones, more than any other, that the same stadium has hosted an inaugural match. Glory remains forever in the totemic Aztec, no matter how much they now want to call it Banorte or Mexico City: sponsors can buy a name, not a story, especially when that story was written by the deities who once ran this lawn. Against South Africa, Mexico also broke an almost century-old curse. The team that has played the most opening games had never achieved a victory on opening day. It was the eighth time he achieved it. There is something deeply Mexican about not giving up. There is something deeply Mexican about standing tall and continuing to find reasons to celebrate.
2
Raúl Rangel, Jesús Gallardo, Johan Vásquez, César Montes, Israel Reyes, Brian Gutiérrez (Luis Chávez, min. 65), Álvaro Fidalgo (Gilberto Mora, min. 65), Roberto Alvarado, Érik Lira (Edson Álvarez, min. 75), Julián Quiñones (Alexis Vega, min. 78) and Raúl Jiménez (Armando González, min. 75)
0
Ronwen Williams, Khuliso Mudau, Ime Okon, Nkosinathi Sibisi, Aubrey Modiba (Oswin Appollis, 76 mins), Mbekezeli Mbokazi, Teboho Mokoena, Jayden Adams, Yaya Sithole, Iqraam Rayners (Evidence Makgopa, 76 mins) and Lyle Foster (Talente Mbatha, 55 min.)
Goals 1-0 min. 8: Julián Quiñones. 2-0 min. 66: Raúl Jiménez
Referee Wilton Pereira Sampaio
yellow cards Teboho Mokoena (min. 16), Brian Gutierrez (min. 22), Nkosinathi Sibisi (min. 73)
red cards Yaya Sithole (49 min.), Themba Zwane (83 min.), César Montes (91 min.)
Mexico returned this Thursday to present itself to the world with its best face. He did it with all his contradictions on his back, without hiding his wounds, and without giving up his virtues. He did it by being the chaotic, excessive, unequal, hospitable, exhausting, fascinating, violent, generous, ancient and modern country that it has always been. He did so by remembering that societies are not measured only by the problems they suffer, but also by the way in which they live with them. From the outside, Mexico usually arrives packaged in a few images; Sometimes it seems as if the entire country has been reduced to a succession of gloomy headlines that barely explain a small part of reality. But Mexico always resists being fully explained. Every attempt to enclose it in a definition ends up defeated by a contradiction.
Perhaps that is why the World Cup finds such a natural setting here. Because football doesn’t understand complete explanations either. In that area of emotions, loyalties and obstinacy more than logic is where Mexico moves best. Also this selection of Javier Aguirre and Rafa Márquez, the local technical duo; a veteran of three World Cups on the bench and the last great legend of the tricolor team who will take over at the end of the tournament.
Aguirre planted the predictable eleven that he has conceived for months. A team with strong defense; with a frame in the containment of Erik Lira; intensity in the middle of the field led by Fidalgo and Quiñones, two of the team’s naturalized players, and entrusted at the top to the seniority of Raúl Jiménez, who is already in his fourth World Cup. The goal went to Rangel, indisputable for Aguirre no matter how much the memorabilia was clear for Memo Ochoa, in the Himalayas of the World Cups together with Messi and Cristiano, all with six calls.
El Vasco had confessed in the preview that he did not know that Mexico had been unable to win one of the seven inaugural matches it had played since 1930 and he planned to use it as motivation for his boys. Whether it was because of breaking the curse or because of the push from the Azteca stands, the game turned in the local team’s face very soon. A resounding failure by Williams, the South African goalkeeper, left the ball at the mercy of Julián Quiñones, who opened the scoring just 10 minutes into the game. Without much fuss, Mexico clearly dominated a limp first half on the pitch, which included the debut of the ‘two halves’ of hydration on each side, one of the new faces to get used to in modern football. The game, when there was one, was a monologue of the tricolor team, entrusting the creation to the boots of Fidalgo and Brian Gutiérrez and the gallop to Quiñones, a martyrdom for the tender, very tender South Africa, which returned to the football Olympus after that 2010 tournament.
Mexico is a country of contrasts that are rarely resolved and almost always coexist. A place where different eras seem to overlap in the same landscape. A country crossed by deep tensions, but also by a collective energy that defies any attempt to reduce it to a single story. That energy was experienced at the Azteca, the absolute protagonist of the inauguration. The 80,000 souls carried the local team in flight.
The start of the second half was a mirror of the first half. The most volcanic Mexico suffocated South Africa in their area in the first minutes. He did not score another goal in Fidalgo’s first attempts, but he did leave Bafana Bafana with one less after Sithole had no choice but to knock down Brian Gutiérrez on the balcony of the area. The game became even more difficult for Aguirre’s team and the second was not long in coming. A robbery, another one, by Quiñones in the South African field allowed the ball to be deployed towards Roberto Alvarado, Aguirre’s great protégé, who complied with the coach and placed a cross on the head of Raúl Jiménez, who placed it without much effort into Williams’ goal. Mexico found no rival in its inauguration and the only discordant note was the unnecessary red card to captain César Montes. South Africa was a sterile guest at the Mexican party, a team that had no choice but to assimilate the Cielito Lindo that was chanted in the stands.
Mexico is a country made of fertile contradictions. A territory where the fractures are evident, but so is an extraordinary capacity to move forward; where the past never ends leaving and the future always seems to be arriving. Few places contain so many different realities and still manage to be recognized as the same country. Something like this happens to this Aguirre team, criticized since he took over and who this Thursday allowed himself to please the fans by making his debut for Gilberto Mora, at 17 years old the youngest player to play in a World Cup, and giving a reel to the ‘Ant’ González, another of the newcomers most acclaimed by the fans.
There was a lot of talk and speculation about whether Mexico could host another World Cup, as if it is not a constant host of major events. And there are countries whose main virtue is order, but Mexico never aspired to that. His greatness lies elsewhere. In the ability to absorb blows that seem definitive and continue. In that inexhaustible energy that allows you to reinvent yourself again and again. In the ease with which he turns adversity into a story and the story into identity. Sometimes it seems that Mexico advances by accumulation rather than planning. That is why it was difficult to contemplate the beginning of this World Cup without thinking about the country that made it possible.
In this World Cup, Mexico dreams of finally winning the fifth game, although the paradox brings with it that this time it does not imply going past the quarterfinals. But before all that happens, Mexico has already managed to leave an impression deeper than any result. It has once again occupied a central place in the global conversation and has done so without trying to seem like another country. With its excesses and its contradictions. With its capacity to despair and to fall in love. He has done it through football. Once again, from Mexico to the world.
