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Deja vu Mexico
Another round of 16 defeat - to Argentina
Sun, June 25, 2006
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LEIPZIG, Germany -- Mexico's World Cup is on a loop. It keeps running over and over and over again.
Get in. Get through. Go home.
The Mexicans are World Cup regulars. Regularly they get through to the Round of 16. Just as regularly they are run off in their first elimination game.
It happened again here in the one token town from the former East Germany chosen to play host to games in this World Cup.
It happened with drama. It happened in overtime. But it happened again. Eleven times now they've made it to the Round of 16 and ended it there.
This time it happened when Maxi Rodridguez scored eight minutes into the first overtime session to give Argentina a 2-1 win to advance the Gauchos against Germany in the quarter-finals.
A CROSS-FIELD PASS
Rodriguez chested a cross-field pass from Juan Pablo Sorin and, before the ball hit the ground, hit a hard left-footed shot from the corner of the area into the far side of the net.
"Really, it was incredible," Rodriguez said. "A very beautiful goal. It was a very hard-fought game and I think this goal put us at ease for the final minutes."
In 13 World Cups, the Mexicans have only managed to make it to the quarters twice - in 1970 and 1986, when it was held in Mexico.
The hat dancers have not only suffered heartbreak in this game over and over again, in '86 they became the first home team to be knocked out without losing a game. They scored three wins and had two draws before losing to then West Germany in a penalty shootout in the quarter-final.
''It was an even game, just as I expected it to be, and it was a magnificent individual goal that decided it,'' said Mexican coach Ricardo La Volpe.
''Having said that, Mexico gave an excellent account of themselves. Once again, though, we didn't achieve what we came to do, which was to reach the quarter-finals at least.''
Argentina, a nation that has been much more mercurial than Mexico at the World Cup, will take the win.
The Argentines, who made it to the final four times and won it twice as well as four times failing to qualify to get here, has six times headed home before the quarter-finals including four years ago at Korea-Japan '02 when disaster struck and the Gauchos didn't get out of group play.
But this Argentina team has the looks of a special squad, although maybe not so much last night. And they were playing this one with a security blanket.
Argentina has never been bounced from the World Cup by anybody other than European sides.
The fans of two Spanish-speaking nations descended on this city of 500,000, quite aware, even after 17 years since the Iron Curtain came down, that they were in East Germany just by looking out the train window.
But there was a surprise at the end of the trek, too.
Virtually built into an old brick walled stadium, on the top of a hill surrounded by ruins of old sports facilities, is what first strikes you as a giant spaceship.
The game wasn't out-of-this-world for an overtime game as these two nations met at the World Cup for the first time since the event was invented back in 1930 in Uruguay.
AN OWN GOAL
Five minutes in, Mexico had a 1-0 lead on a goal by Rafael Marquez, but gave it up five minutes later on an own goal credited to Hernan Crespo. At that point it looked like it was going to be a dandy.
But nothing happened after that.
Not for long, long stretches of time.
Argentina keeper Roberto Abbondanzieri was required to make an extra large save on Jared Borgetti in the 25th minute.
Mexico had a scoring chance in the 59th minute and Argentina had another in the 75th.
But until Rodriguez put his right foot into one and drilled it under the bar, there weren't a great many highlight-reel plays to show around the world.
So, they'll end up showing the one goal again and again and again - the goal that did Mexico in again.
So put the goal on a loop and run it over and over. They've seen this loop running before in old Mexico.
Different goal. Same old story.
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