One year ago, Miguel Herrera led Mexico to the World Cup Round of 16 and injected hope into a nation that a year earlier, two years ago, was struggling through CONCACAF qualification. This year’s edition of the Gold Cup provides Mexico with the opportunity to force a play-off with the United States, should they win the Gold Cup, in order to advance to the 2017 Confederations Cup. They got off to a good start with a 6-0 drubbing of Cuba, however, were held to a scoreless tie in their follow up game against Guatemala. Herrera goes into the final group stage game against group leaders Trinidad and Tobago having to win in order to win the group as they were expected to.
Headed into this year’s Gold Cup, Herrera is coming off a disappointing performance in CONMEBOL’s Copa America in Chile, failing to survive the group stage after announcing that the team was good enough to make the semi finals. Herrera named a “B” squad for the Copa America, saving his best players for the Gold Cup. Unfortunately the lack of results in Chile combined with the loss of star striker Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez to a broken collarbone in a friendly before the tournament have only increased the need for Herrera to prove that he can still lead this version of the national team to a Gold Cup victory.
Herrera’s honeymoon with the national team began to dissipate in November when Mexico traveled to Belarus and lost 3-2 on the heels of a huge win against the Netherlands just six days earlier. It can be argued that Herrera was using a European based group of players with few Liga MX players, however, taking a look at the Gold Cup roster, 14 of the 23 players are Liga MX players while the player who scored both goals in that game, Raul Jimenez, didn’t make the current roster.
The next strike against Herrera and the national team was losing to the United States in a friendly in April using all Liga MX based players. Mexico dropped that game 2-0 in front of a mostly Mexican fan base in San Antonio. The final straw was the failed Copa America campaign in which he persistently stated that the semifinals was a realistic goal for the team, only to be one of the only four team to not reach the quarterfinals, out of 12 teams.
The focus since the end of last year’s World Cup was always the Gold Cup. The United States won the 2013 Gold Cup, which means that Mexico must win this year’s edition of the tournament to force a one game playoff with the U.S. for a chance to qualify for the 2017 Confederations Cup. Mexico qualified to play in the last edition of the Confederations Cup in 2013 and while they did not advance past the group stage, they gained valuable experience playing teams like Brazil, Italy and Japan while adapting to Brazil for the World Cup the following year.
In a poll by Mexican newspaper La Republica, an informal poll showed that only 51 percent of respondents currently support Herrera, while 31 percent are opposed to Herrera. This is a coach who won the Liga MX Clausura title in 2013, only six months after being hired as manager and then being asked to leave such a good situation to coach the national team into the World Cup, which he did emphatically by defeating New Zealand 9-3 on aggregate.
Herrera is now under pressure to win this Gold Cup and eventually qualify for the Confederations Cup. There has been no word on what his fate will be if he doesn’t complete both goals; however, the writing is on the wall now that the honeymoon is over. It is unfortunate for Herrera that the CONCACAF teams have improved over the past two Gold Cups and it is no longer a two horse race for the region’s championship tournament. This will make his road tougher as has already been seen from their 0-0 tie against Guatemala and some of the results in the tournament so far, such as Jamaica winning their group over Costa Rica or Honduras being eliminated after being one of four CONCACAF teams in last year’s World Cup.
Herrera is currently coaching for his job, unfortunately it may require two wins in a row against the United States, which last occurred when Mexico defeated the U.S. three times in a row in the Gold Cup 2009 Final, a World Cup qualifier two weeks later and then the Gold Cup 2011 Final.
