not sure if this is the right place for it, but seems as good as any... from goal the gist: players need 10 seasons (5 years) in mexico and can then start their naturalization process. article mentions some main candidates who could make the switch and have an impact: Christian Gimenez, Lucas Lobos, Lucas Silva, Rubens Sambueza to name a few. anyone have any insight into those guys? i don't watch too much MX liga. kinda frustrating for a nats fan, seeing how jamaica has done the same thing (to mixed results) and now mexico may be set to reload with seasoned, hungry professionals. you'd think that with the gamesmanship and "exceptionalism" that the usa plays up, it would be us fast tracking guys as well. instead, it seems like more often than not, especially domestically, guys get caught up in the long, convoluted process and they're either lost to other countries or decline before it's all done and dusted. my other question would be what other guys are waiting in the wings ready to join el tri that we should be aware of?
Meh. I'm much more concerned about the duel for Mexican-American players. That's a situation that actually directly affects us, and since the battle starts at the youth level, we're talking about players that could have long national team careers. Since Liga MX has allows 5 foreign player spots, they don't tend to use them on very young players, so by the time players get citizenship, they should be in their late 20s at least, if not 30s. If I'm not mistaken, I believe Liga MX recruits almost exclusively from the Americas. I think Mexico is pretty much as good as any team in the Americas except for Brazil or Argentina (though Colombia is having an excellent cycle). Thus, most of the players they would want to recruit, if they were good enough to become an impact player for Mexico, they would probably already have featured for their national team in some capacity. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that if you appear for a national team in any capacity - even at the youth level - you can only switch to a country that you already had citizenship for at that time. So Mexico would only be able to recruit players that didn't merit consideration from their national teams. Obviously Brazil is deep enough in talent that I wouldn't rule out a couple players being found that could help, but I hardly think it will be all that important.
I hope they do it, just so that we can laugh at them. I really think that's the most important aspect in this story.
Hasn't Mexico been doing this for at least a decade now, mainly with Argies and Brazilians? Guillermo Franco, Zinha, Matías Vuoso, Leandro Augusto, Lucas Ayala, Damian Alvarez, etc...
A lot of those players are good but as long as they have a coach who does not know what he is doing it is kind of moot.
Not all Mexicans will be thrilled by it either. The nationalistic/Chivas type person will rail against it any chance they get, and many Mex players will not be as welcoming as we are here in the US. It's a double edged sword. More importantly it's something we can use to laugh at them for...I agree. That's the best part considering all the crap the worst part of their fan base spews. Pretty delicious actually.
Why would we be arguing for the chances to make our national team more Mexican-American when our u-20 team already doesn't reflect the country? I will not support a majority team who grew up supporting el tri. Lets keep the even balance here
So would you not support our national basketball team because it's mostly black and "doesn't reflect the country?" Mexican-Americans are Americans, just as much as you are. Frankly if you're attitude is that you won't support a team with them on it, then good riddance.
i think the note is not focused in the real story about this. this happens because the clubs want more talented players to be competitive in Liga MX. The clubs can only have 5 foreing players, the only way that they can have more than 5 foreing players is through the dual citizen. Obviously if there are good foreign players that be available to MXNT they could be called. In mexico we don't like at all to have foreing players in our NT so if plenty of these foreing players are called Chepo could be in a trouble. In some cases "mexican-americans players" are seen as mexicans such as Ponce and Richard Sanchez. IMO there is only one foreing player that could contribute something different in the senior NT and that player is Lucas Lobos. Christian Gimenez, Damian Alvarez, Martin Bravo (all of them are from Argentina) and Lucas Silva are similar players than we currently have. One more time, the problem of our NT is not the players, is the coaching and the system they want to develop in all categories.
MLS and USSF fault for not finding these players. I believe Liga MX sides can just take any Mex-American players they want from a DA side without MLS getting anything in return. Alonso Hernandez who is currently on US U-20's is from El Paso, Texas. Ramos admitted he hadn't heard of him until very late in the process. And Hernandez appeared a few times for Monterrey prior to his U-20 call up.
Agreed 100%. An American is an American is an American. Anybody who questions the authenticity of someone's claim to being American just because his parents grew up in Mexico is undermining the entire national identity. We are a multicultural and multiethnic nation. Being an American is not contingent on any sort of heritage test.
So...does that mean I'm supposed to stop supporting the national team until JK calls up a Mormon? Wow, I miss Neg Rep...
That was just a nonsensical post! Is the US hockey team representative of the US population? No. Is the US basketball team representative of the US population? No. I bet I could find a picture of the US cricket team and it would be a bunch of ex-pat Indians. We had endless debates about 15 years ago about the complete and total lack of latinos and Mexican-Americans in US youth teams. And the USSF has stressed inclusionary programs. Now we have TOO MANY talented young Mexican-Americans according to some!!! Here's the deal. I want the best kids making our youth rosters regardless of race. If that means the squad is 2/3 latinos, then so be it. (and our current U20 team is close to that percentage.) If Pelosi, Packwood, Zimmerman, and McBean weren't injured, they'd have changed the demographics of the squad (plus JAB's availability issues). What Mexico is doing is no different than what other national teams are doing. They're just trying to see how to get the best talent on their squad.
Going to concur with the popular opinion that an American is an American regardless of ethnicity. God knows that minorities have had to cope with the lack of minority role models in many areas, white people can do the same. At the end of the day, we're all human.
This is one of the reasons why a lot of Mexican American kids will continue to root/play for Mexico instead of the US.
Because of one outlier? Luis Gil, Jose Villareal, Juan Ocegueda, Benji Joya and Alonso Hernandez seem to be a smarter than that.
Why would US Soccer and US fans care if Cristian Gimenez acquires a Mexican passport and allows Cruz Azul to go out and use his foreign player spot to acquire another forward?