Recently capped Mexican-American Edgar Castillo and Santos take on Pachuca today from Estadio Hidalgo. Edgar is a Yank Abroad by the definition of Big Soccer, so please let's not have 400 posts on whether he's an American or not. And stay away from the politics, this isn't the place for that. If you have nothing good to say, don't say anything at all. Sonny Guadarrama, another talented Mexican-American also is on the Santos Roster. I haven't been paying much attention to him this season, so perhaps some of our Mexican friends can tell us what his status is. He doesn't appear to have made any appearances this season. All I remember about him is that he's been going back and forth between US and Mexican youth teams. This is an interesting early-season fixture. Pachuca is undefeated in Group 1 and Santos is undefeated in Group 2. http://soccernet.espn.go.com/tables?league=mex.1&cc=5901
I started this thread about Castillo and Guadarrama, but perhaps I can mention some other Mexican-Americans and their matches this weekend. We don't usually have threads on all of their matches, so perhaps one thread is fine. Michael Orozco and San Luis take on Toluca from Estadio Bombonera. Michael has played in San Luis' last two games against Necaxa and Cruz Azul. They now sit in first place in the group 3 standings. This game is on Sunday. Jesus Padilla and Chivas of Guadalajara take on Atlas on Saturday at Estadio Jalisco. Jesus has come as a substitute in their last two games against UAG (aka Tecos) and Morelia. Chivas has started the season slowly with 2 draws and a win. Sammy Ochoa and Tecos take on Club America on Sunday at Estadio Azteca. I have question, is he also known as Sammy Ochoa Oregel? To me it doesn't look like Sammy has played in the owls last two games.
Castillo went all 90 minutes as Santos upset champion Pachuca. Pachuca had not last a home game in over a year. With the Tuzos defeated, Santos is the last remaining team (4-0) to have won all its games this season. Since Santos was facing the possibility of relegation (in Mexico its averaged over several seasons not based on a single-season's standings) this early hot streak moves them away from the hot seat. Game boxscore: http://www.mediotiempo.com/fmf/primera/apertura_2007/ficha.php?id_partido=17889 Castillo has played every minute for the current "SuperLider" of the Mexican league. BTW, Jorge Vergara, probably doesn't want to hear anything about it, but Jesus Padilla does qualify as a Yank Abroad (if the posts about him acquiring US citizenship through his family are correct). Chivas fans might view that as a sign of the apocalypse. Next big acquisition for Guadalajara will probably be Landon Donovan!
In that very same game there was a second Yank that also went 90 but was playing with Pachuca, his name is Jose Francisco Torres, he's an 87 native of Texas who has played in the Tuzos youth system for quite some time now, the kid is a left mid/left back and even though I have only seen him a couple times he looks like a decent player. Other Yanks in Mexico this week with action were Micheal Orozco going 90 for San Luis in the defeat of his team against Toluca, then on the second tier circuit there was Sonny Guadarrama playing 90 and scoring 2 goal for Santos second team against Queretaro in the 3-1 victory of his side, finally Marco Vidal with Indios de Ciudad Juarez played 70 minutes in a game that ended up tied at 1 between his club and the second team of America. Jesus Padilla saw no action this weekend, but he was on the bench during the victory of Chivas over Atlas on Saturday, another guy that saw no action was Sammy Ochoa who's probably injured since he hasn't played a single minute this season on neither first or second division.