By IVES GALARCEP
Santos Laguna and Monterrey have scored goals in bunches throughout the CONCACAF Champions League tournament, but when the two Mexican powerhouse squared off in the first leg of the final on Wednesday, neither could find the net.
Santos and Monterrey played to a scoreless draw in Torreon in the first leg of their CONCACAF Champions League final series.
Santos looked like they would have a golden opportunity to jump into the lead when Monterrey had Cesar Delgado sent off for a hard tackle on U.S. Men’s National Team forward Herculez Gomez in the 66th minute. Unfortunately for the Guerreros, they couldn’t capitalize on their 24 minutes with a man advantage.
The teams will meet again on May 1st in Monterrey, with Santos Laguna holding a reasonable edge after keeping Monterrey from scoring a road goal. Now any score draw would give Santos the CONCACAF Champions League title and the berth in the Club World Cup that goes with it.
Here are match highlights.
Here are some more stories to get your Thursday going:
LEWANDOWSKI TO LEAVE DORTMUND
On the same day he shook up the soccer world by dropping four goals on Real Madrid in the UEFA Champions League semifinals, Robert Lewandowski was the subject of transfer rumors linking him to a summer departure from Borussia Dortmund.
That isn’t exactly a big surprise, but the rumors circulating of Lewandowski joining Mario Goetze in a move to Bayern Munich is what really turned heads on Wednesday. The Manchester United target has just one year left on his Borussia Dortmund contract after this season and is expected to make a move, even though Dortmund officials are insistent that they don’t want him to move and don’t need to sell him.
BRAZIL BOOED AFTER TYING CHILE
The Brazilian Men’s National Team continued a rather underwhelming pre-World Cup tour of friendlies on Wednesday with a 2-2 draw against Chile that led to many of the more than 53,000 Brazilian fans at Belo Horizonte Stadium booing the home team.
The Brazil squad, a team made up of players from the Brazilian league, couldn’t please the majority of Brazil fans in attendance even though the team did score some goals and did feature the likes of Ronaldinho and Neymar.
RODGERS FURIOUS OVER LENGTH OF SUAREZ BAN
To the surprise of very few, Liverpool manager Brendan Rogers has stepped forward and expressed outrage over the length of Luis Suarez’s suspension for biting Branislav Ivanovic last Sunday.
The Liverpool manager insisted that Suarez needs help, and not a harsh punishment, after his shocking behavior last weekend.
‘We have got a punishment that is no way in helping the rehabilitation of the player, Rodgers said. “He needs help. That is what we will look to provide. The biggest thing is to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Suarez will miss the remainder of the current season, and sit out the first six matches of next season as well.
———-
What do you think of these developments? See Santos Laguna beating Monterrey in the second leg? Where would you like to see Lewandowski go? Think it’s crazy that Bayern Munich might add both Mario Goetze and Robert Lewandowski this summer?
Share your thoughts below.