Mexico has had its fair share of success against Brazil through the years, and 'El Tri' stifled the South Americans yet again, shutting down the high-powered 'Selecao' attack on their way to a 2-0 victory on Sunday at Cowboys Stadium.
Giovani Dos Santos played the role of hero, scoring a goal and setting up another by drawing a penalty, to give the Mexican squad a big boost heading into World Cup qualifying.
It was the performance by the Mexican defense that proved especially impressive, as an organized and tenacious back-line frustrated Brazil for much of the afternoon, with goalkeeper Jesus Corona stepping up with some outstanding saves in a five-save effort.
Mexico kicks off World Cup qualifying on Friday against Guyana before meeting El Salvador in a week. Brazil continues its tour of the United States on Saturday with a friendly against arch-rival Argentina at Met Life Stadium in New Jersey.
Here are some other stories from the weekend to get your Monday going:
COLOMBIA TOPS PERU
It was a match both teams needed to give their World Cup dreams hope, and it was Colombia that gave their qualifying chances a major boost with a 1-0 victory over Peru in Lima.
James Rodriguez provided the second-half winner, giving the Colombians a vital victory in the official debut of head coach Jose Pekerman.
The victory pushed Colombia to seven points, right into the mix for qualifying. For Peru, the devastating home defeat leaves them with just three points and second from bottom in the South American World Cup qualifying group.
OLIC TO MISS EUROS FOR CROATIA
Bayern Munich striker and Croatian national team star Ivica Olic will miss the European Championships with a thigh injury, a devastating blow to Croatia's hopes of progressing in the Euros.
Nikola Kalinic has been called in to replace Olic, while Everton striker Nikica Jelavic will likely take over Olic's starting role on the squad.
QUICK KICKS
Italian defender Andrea Barzagli looks set to miss the Euros with a calf strain. No final decision yet on whether to replace him, but it's not looking good.
Queens Park Rangers midfielder Joey Barton was attacked outside a Liverpool night club.
Steve McManaman has resigned as Birmingham City Executive Director (raise your hand if you knew he had another job besides TV commentator).
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What did you think of Mexico's performance? See Colombia qualifying for the World Cup? Can you picture Croatia advancing out of the group stage at Euros without Olic?
Share your thoughts below.
get your own name fool.
This is crazy, instead of lookng at our failure we are envious of someone else’s success. It is no secret, for right now, Mexico is a better team than the US, period. Ranked 20 as compared to our 29 in the world, beat us 4 to 2 in our last encounter, beat the team that, thats one of the best in the world, beat us 4-1(like just the other day), 2-0….in other words Brazil couldnt even score!!!….and completely shutdown Neymar and Marcelo, who we couldn’t stop at all. We just need to look inwards and try to fix our problem and fine tune our team, because for right now, it is no contest, we are the underdogs
Why do we always have to compare ourselves to Mx? why do we have to look at their wins and our loses or vice versa? it’s like wanting to be mediocre as a goal.. we should be comparing ourselves with argentina, brazil, england, italy and germany, not some third-world-country team that uses our fields to come over and congregate people who if grateful at all should be backing the US…
Not only surprise, but you could see his frustration that he lofted the ball over the near post run as he backed away from the play, only to later celebrate when the ball unexpectedly dinged the post and went in.
The Mexican NT has only proven to be competitive on a regular basis over the past 30 years.
Also, the history of professional soccer in Mexico isn’t 100 years old as you keep claiming in some futile attempt at making yourself feel better about the obvious gaps in performance and development between these two teams.
I want to see Mexico play 3 straight games in Europe against two powerhouse. Let me take that back. I would like for Mexico to play 3 European teams in their home soil. Not some European team in a different euro country but in the oppositions home.
Belgium, France, and Italy. I would really like to see this. Or have the Mex-team play Sweden and Poland in those two countries. I’m pretty sure El chepo would be out of work after these 3 matches. Or let’s make it easier. Have the Mexican federation set up 2 games in Central America. One in Cuscatlán and the other in Estadio OlÃmpico Metropolitano. I’m pretty sure they would lose those two as well.
Let’s stop this Mex riding already. U.S & Mex are in the same level. No one is surpassing anyone anytime soon. The fact that we have been playing serious for 20 years and they’ve been on it for 100+ years is embarrassing for them… I’m just saying
Mexico barely beat Bosnia but U.S didn’t beat Canada. You must be new to this game.
Look peabrain……
That what he was trying to say. Calm down and don’t get in a man’s conversation.
Peru sucks and USMNT sucks. : p
US Mutant Ninja Turtles. : p. = USMNT
Stick to the football points. You may find something interesting or of value in them.
Shut up and stuff a taco full of “carne molida” down your throat. Look who has won on aggregate.Mexico sucks.
He did not say that, you dope!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yeah, barely beat Bosnia. I rest my case. Mexico sucks.
Mexico played well against Brazil even though Brazil dominated. Mexico sucks
The U.S. finished better than Mexico in the 2010 WC and have won the last two Hex.
Shut up, please!!Dos Santos is a little fruitcake.
Um.. When did England dominate Germany again?
England loses to Germany, who lose to Italy. Who lose to themselves.
maybe “better” was the wrong word. the USA were more consistent and more of a constant threat. which is unusual when compared to Mexico.
oh yeah! totally forgot about possession. again, another stat that is usually the other way around.
no, you just don’t comprehend the point being made. first of all, the USA had 5 out 15 on goal (not 4…lol). the point being made was that our offense was able to get forward and create chances. i didn’t say our finishing was better than Mexico’s, obviously it wasn’t. just like Brazil yesterday.
this isn’t a hit against Mexico or anything like that. so i’m not even sure why you are talking about Mexico not being a one-dimensional team or being good at possession. no s$%@, what else is new?
my point was simply that the USA actually created more chances than Mexico against Brazil (even if they couldn’t put shots on target) while Mexico was better defensively. which was opposite of what usually happens.
They also played Wales 3 days before but I guess that one was not as tough 🙂
I completely agree plus the wind was blowing NW and the sun was at a 54deg angle. With that and the fact that birds were flying overtop and there were 2,537 mosquitos, we can all agree that all factors were against Brazil (opposite of when they played us)….but I’m not taking anything away from Mexico. Just saying…
I keep reading this. But a few of Mexico starters did not play; they had just arrived and where not used.
It was disappointing to see Peru not being able to produce a good result. They need more potent midfielders to win games. Peckerman made some tactical decisions in the second half that peru wasn’t able to deal with, it was more obvious when labton was taken out. Hope they get it together for Sunday.
Cheeky chip is a euphamism for mis-hit crosses these days?
Dos Santos reaction to it going in was one of surprise.
Austin, if you decided to claim that Mexico will dominate us for the next decade and use their U23 team as a proof of future domination, you have to consider that our U23 team completely outplayed Mexico’s U23 team in their only head-to-head match up and the US had something like 70% of possession, which is traditionally Mexico’s strong suit.
Are you forgetting that Mexico had a very tough game against Bosnia this past week? They barely won that game. I’m sure Mexico was also feeling very tired.
+1 and Brazil did not even complain about the penalty, Giovani made the most of it there was still contact and no one complained about whether it was a good call or not.
My take on both the US and Brazil teams was the game they played against each other was very taxing on their bodies. It was evident that both teams were tired in the next match-ups. Im not taking anything away from Mexico but if that game was first we’d see a different scoreline. not saying they would have lost but when the entire midfield of Brazil is just standing there ball watching and not making runs its pretty obvious the end result is a 30 yd boot by Hulk into the stands.
Musta been a different Mexico-Brazil match you watched. In the one on yesterday from Dallas, Dos Santos quite clearly earned a penalty by smartly waiting for what was a clearly dumb move by the Brazilian defender.
Yes, maybe 60% to 40% wins and loses, but that record was on US soil, while playing in narrow american football pitches, baseball fields and the like, with lousy one sided reffering! While on Mexican soil we are 100% to zero!!!! through out history.
How is that for domination!
Joey Barton attacked? Must’ve been a Man Utd. fan….
Mexico had a very good game. Even though Brazil held most of the possession it still felt Mexico had the game under control.
Donovan needs to be put on a milk carton because he hasn’t been seen since the Scotland match. Meanwhile, Mexico’s #10 is scoring cheeky chips while not getting club minutes for Spurs.
Bryan, you are making good points. I will also add that Brazil dominated possession against Mexico (67% percent possession vs 33% by Mexico), while in the game against US possession numbers were very close (52% to 48%). Hats off to Mexico for getting the result, but it’s not like they obliterated Brazil.
Someone obviously doesn’t understand the difference between shots and shots on goal.
Brazil had seven shots on goal against the US while the US only mustered four. Mexico and Brazil had the same number of shots on goal yesterday with five.
It sucks to say this but Mexico isn’t a one-dimensional team. They can maintain possession and knock the ball around when the time calls for it but they can also stay compact, cede possession and counter attack effectively at will.
The US established itself as (mostly) an equal to Mexico over the last decade, and this rivalry will surely have its cycles where one dominates the other like Brazil-Argentina, England-Germany, etc. I would have preferred another 10 years of wins by the US to make up for the first 40 years, but oh well…
Well, Mexico is a very adept counterattacking team and the US could have looked good too. Compare it to the game against Scotland; if against Brazil the US does not give up an early penalty but gets an early goal instead, then we could defend more compactly and look to threaten on the counter. Brazil would become more stretched as they tried to equalize. This is what happened vs. Mexico and it is why Klinsmann always stresses scoring early as it is often the difference between close wins and seemingly comfortable ones.
A win is still not guaranteed, and Mexico are a very talented team; but the game is completely different when you score early at home imo.
Their defense was better, but our offense was better. We out shot Brazil 15-12. Mexico had 5 shots to Brazil’s 16. Gio’s goal was a great finish and they got a PK on the other. But like our 4-1 scoreline did not reflect the game accurately, the same could be said for the Mexio game.
But hey, if I was Mexico, I would be very happy about the result. They should be. They went 3-0 while the USA went 1-1-1.
olympic qualifying*
last decade we dominated mexico and this decade it is looking like they will dominate us.
Gold Cup Winners
u-17 world cup winners
u-23 world cup qualifying tourney winners
Here is hoping that we can win the Hex,
Dos a Cero
“earned a penalty” is really a stretch. It was a huge dive.
They defended well as a group, however; at the same time Brazil did look sluggish out there and Neymar gave the ball away repeatedly.
I’m a USMNT fan, and it hurt to see Mexico do that yesterday, but you have to give them credit, they played well.
But it was obvious the games and travel has gotten to Brazil.
Are you saying thAt Mexico has never won a game outside of the u.s. They played chile in bercelona and Poland in Poland and did not lose either one. Look I want the u.s to have success. I get tired of (U.S)being kicked around like a dog and concavaf treated like a step child.
I wish I watched this game.
Mexico playing on US soil is a home game for them. They play more on US soil than they do in Mexico. I’d like to see what their record is outside the USA and Mexico. The USA has looked far better outside North America than Mexico has over the past decade since WC 2002…That said, I do root for Mexico and CONCACAF teams when the USA is not involved.
Marcelo and Neymar did almost nothing all game long and both showed their frustration at the end.
The most frustrating thing about the Mexico win (aside from coming on US soil) was how well they defended.
The U.S. created plenty of chances against Brazil, but our D was carved up. That’s not typically Mexico’s strong suit, and it’s frustrating to see us lagging behind on both sides of the pitch.