The Tri Femenil started its new era under coach Pedro López in the 2023 Women’s Revelations Cup tournament against Nigeria. Kiana Palacios scored the only goal of the match.
After the disappointment that represented hadn’t been able to qualify for the Women’s World Cup 2023, México started the year under a new era, with a new coach and a new general manager of its women’s teams.
General manager Andrea Rodebaugh and coach Pedro López have the difficult task of taking this talented group of players and helping them to secure a spot for the Women’s World Cup in 2027. It’s going to be a long and difficult path, but it looks like the FMF is trying to do everything in its power to achieve success on its women’s side and the Revelations Cup is an excellent example of this.
Despite the fact that Mexico won’t compete in Australia/New Zealand this year, they organized this tournament with nations that will be there. Costa Rica will participate in the World Cup for the second time in their history; Colombia is the Copa América runner-up and not only has qualified for the world cup but also will play Olympics in 2024; and Nigeria is a tough opponent, that has many players in Europe and one in the NWSL.
The National Team is calling
The first call-up of the year by López left people with questions. His first starting 11 brought even more questions, maybe the most pressing one being the role of Miah Zuazua as a fullback.
At her club Juárez, she plays as a winger and does a very good job there. Given that, nobody expected to see her in the defensive line but that’s where López decided to put her in the national team.
It wouldn’t be the first time an attacker ends up in the defense line. England’s Rachel Daly used to play as a 9 in her former club, Houston Dash, and she plays as a right back for the national team. At Aston Villa, her new club, she often plays as a 9 or on the flanks.
In the case of Zuazua, her journey as a converted full-back has just started and so she has things to work on but she showed an interesting set of abilities as a full-back, nonetheless. Maybe the most interesting of them is her capacity to make long, precise passes from the defensive third that can break the opponent’s lines and put her teammates in scoring positions.
Unlike Anika Rodríguez, left back, Zuazua’s didn’t go all the way to the final third. She added herself to the attack mostly on set pieces but other than that, she barely crossed the midfield.
Nigeria created some trouble mostly in the first half but after some injured players that forced coach Randy Waldrum to make substitutions, the Super Falcons’ plan started to fail, and Mexico was more comfortable with the ball in the second half.
Some mistakes when trying to build from behind showed Nigeria’s problems in defense and when we thought that the game was going to finish with no goals, the Super Falcons’ goalkeeper Chiamaka Nnadozie gave the ball away and Tri Femenil took advantage of it.
Kiana Palacios, one of the top goal scorers of the Mexican league with Club América, scored in the 85th minute with a very nice assist by Jacqui “La Maga” Ovalle.
Nigeria put on a fight in the final minutes of the game but there was not enough gas in the tank to add numbers to the attack and they couldn’t get the equalizer.
After this game and the draw in the Colombia vs. Costa Rica game, Mexico is at the top of the table. Let’s remember that the winner of the Revelations Cup will be the national team with the most points in this round-robin tournament.
At the end of the game, López was relieved to have started his campaign with a win but he also recognized that the journey is just getting started.
“We still have a long way to go, I have seen that they want the ball, that they are capable of taking it from one place to another,” López said. “We have tried to build from behind, defending and with the idea of having the ball, creating danger.”
He also praised Zuazua, saying “she’s a player with a lot of quality.”
And speaking of Zuazua, it will be important to keep an eye on her and what the coach will do when Kenti Robles is available. According to López, he expects to count on the veteran fullback against Costa Rica on Sunday.
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