Top 5 - Mexico Soccer Teams
Mexico hasn’t been very successful at national team level, since they only managed to reach the World Cup quarter finals on two occasions (both in World Cups held in Mexico). However, teams in Mexico gradually became more powerful and today they are considered a force to be reckoned with in American soil as well as on an international club level.
I was planning to make a top 5 of the Mexico teams, but I decided against ranking them, because that might stir some trouble with the fans, such as a fan asking why is team over team in the ranking, since won more championships and so forth. Here are what I believe to be the most important teams in Mexico, ranked by alphabet only :).
> Mexico Teams – Club America
Club America was founded in 1916, being one of the oldest professional clubs in Mexico, although the first league title was not to be won until 1956-1966. They’re currently the owners of 10 national championships, being only second to Chivas de Guadalajara, who have won 11 titles in their history. The two are the most successful teams in Mexico from a silverware point of view and Chivas is the historical nemesis of America, so a match between the two is a derby that the entire country awaits.
Club America gets credit for discovering or highlighting players such as Cuauhtemoc Blanco, Enrique Borja, Carlos Hermosillo, Pavel Pardo, Zizinho, Claudio Lopez, Ivan Zamorano or Ilie Dumitrescu.
> Mexico Teams - Chivas de Guadalajara
The club’s official name is Club Deportivo Guadalajara, but every fan in Mexico knows them as Chivas (the goats). Their tally of 11 league titles makes Chivas the most successful of all teams in Mexico, trailing arch-nemesis America by one title. They’re also very loved for their Mexican-only policy, in that they never use foreigners and focus only on local Mexican players.
Their popularity reaches far beyond the borders of Mexico and into the United States, where a team called Chivas USA was formed. The Mexican Chivas have credit for launching players such as Salvador Reyes, Omar Bravo, Claudio Suarez, Juan Palencia, Gonzalo Pineda, Luis Garcia or Carlos Hermosillo.
> Mexico Teams - Pachuca
Despite being the oldest club in Mexican history, being founded in 1901, Pachuca has only become truly competitive in the past few decades. Winning the Primera Division 5
times in the last 8 years and the CONCACAF Champions Cup twice, in 2002 and 2007, Pachuca rose to become a force amongst the teams in Mexico.
The most notable players that got to play for Pachuca include: Jared Borgetti, Jaime Correa, Fausto Pinto, Damian Alvarez, Mosquera, Ivan Hurtado and Juan Arango.
> Mexico Teams - Pumas
Because of the team’s close relation to UNAM, the largest university in Mexico, the club became known as UNAM Pumas, although their official name is Club Universidad Nacional A.C. Although the Pumas don’t have the same history as some of the other top clubs in Mexico, having been founded in 1954, they definitely made their years of existence count, winning 5 league champs, 3 CONCACAF Cups, 1 Interamerican Cup as well as several smaller silverware.
Amongst the players that wore the Pumas logo on their shirt in the club’s fifty-year existence, the most important are: Enrique Borja, Hugo Sanchez, Jorge Campos, Alberto Aspe, Luis Garcia, Esteban Solari, Emerson, Ailton da Silva or Dario Veron.
> Mexico Teams - Toluca
Toluca was a force amongst the teams in Mexico ever since the 1960s, having won 8 championship titles since then. Ever since Toluca’s founding in 1917, they have been known as an offensive team who throws their dice on the attackers, somewhat neglecting the defensive part of the game. This philosophy was a double edged sword, as Toluca varied between relegation places and titles in the 60s and 70s.
Obviously, today this attacking mentality is a lot less noticeable and Toluca’s game has become more tactical. Some of the notable players that wore Toluca’s red and white shirt include: Enrique Alfaro, Zinha, Pedro Romero, Enzo Trossero, Dario Rodriguez, Jose Cardozo, Fabian Estay, Darko Vukic and Juan Antonio Pizzi.
