Sports Illustrated Chimes in

For the past few months, SI.com has been providing team capsules of the 32 teams playing in Germany. Luis Bueno’s capsule of Mexico was published today.

I agree with the majority of Mr. Bueno’s observations. He and both beleive Mexico’s first match vs. Iran is the most important. I would like to expand this by pointing out that Mexico will be playing in a very hostile environment when they square off vs. Team Melli because of the large Iranian population living not only in Germany, but in all of Europe. Iran played well in France 98; They defeated the USA, and they should have beaten Yugoslavia, which would have put them in round 2. Oh, and they had plenty of crowd support.

I also find it unnerving that the talking heads of Mexican media already have Mexico’s 2nd round ticket punched. Iran, Angola, and Portugal will each offer Mexico a very different but equally stern test. Ricardo Lavolpe has already warned his players of overconfidence, and I think we can all agree that he will hammer that point home in the next 2 months.

Back to Bueno, he talks about Mexico’s youth movement. Of the 26 players Lavolpe has selected, 8 are 25 and under, and 7 or 30 and over. So as much as there is youthful exuberance, there is also veteran leadership.