Well, early days yet but half way through Jornada 2 and the team in form at the moment are, without doubt, Santos Laguna
4-1 last week and now a 4-0 destruction of Pumas this week.

Christian Benitez seems to be enjoying his return to Mexico after a seaon (2?) in Birmingham. Two goals last week, another one this week.
He said he's out to be top scorer in the league now he's back. A good start made....

Cruz Azul also on 2 from 2 and not conceded a goal yet.
Inca will be smiling today.

Just behind them are Queretaro, also on 2 from 2 after beating Rojinegro's beloved Atlas.
Not a great start for the Zorros. Two defeats from two away games. No doubt things will improve....

Toluca v Pachuca later. Toluca trying for their first points of the season, Pachuca hoping for their second win.
Should be a good game. Toluca always hard to beat at home, Pachuca took America apart last week.
Could go either way, but Toluca will hopefully edge it with the home advantage.

Then finally America have a chance to get some points on the board against Jaguares.
Wouldn't bet on it happening though!

Chivas v Morelia is postponed to 6th October, presumably to give Chivas a rest after the game against Man Utd in mid week.

So, points on the board for America after their expensive front line get it together for a 3 - 0 win against a poor Jaguares team.

Toluca just manage a draw with an 88th minute equaliser at home to Pachuca.
Really not a great start for the Diablos Rojos but this is often the case for defending champions
Still, the draw meant that they have lost just once in their last 33 home matches. Not a bad record I guess.

As Rojinegro says, with the torneos cortos it's often not apparent who'll be challenging until the liguilla

Well, Santos continuing their perfect start to the tournament.
This time winning 3-0 at Pachuca.
Beating Pachuca by that kind of score is no mean feat, but to do it on their own pitch....
Chucho Benitez keeps up his goal scoring - 2 more to add to the tally.

Toluca were lucky to leave Chiapas with a point from their match against Jaguares.
Really not a good start at all, 1 defeat and 2 draws so far.
I'm trying to look for the positves, but don't seem to be many.
Talavera is on good form in goal (thank God or we'd be really fucked already!) and the youngsters are still being brought through the ranks.
Antonio Rios has been a regular starter this season and all 3 subs yesterday were young blood, inc. Brizuela who scored the Toluca goal.

Atlas and Atlante can't seem to get their 1st point on the board, both losing again last night.

Today sees the match of the week at CU - Pumas take on an in form Cruz Azul.
Should be a good one.....

After Sunday's games, it's now just Santos Laguna with 3 out of 3.
Morelia are 2 out of 2 with a game in hand.

Puebla, Monterrey and Chivas all remain unbeaten (Chivas still only played 2 games so far...)

Pumas took care of Cruz Azul with a 2-0 home win and Morelia put 6 past Queretaro (including a hat trick from Miguel Sabah)

Poor Estudiantes still yet to get a point after their 3rd defeat, they join Atlas and Atlante at the bottom.
Estudiantes are still Tecos to me.
Changing their name doesn't mean they're good all of a sudden. You can't polish a turd after all...

Tecos are a really weird team. Of the sort of consistent first division teams, they are one of the lowest drawing teams in the league. They are serially outnumbered at their own ground when the big teams come calling. In fact, there's a bunch of second division teams that would be more interesting to have in the first division including Leon or Tijuana. Tecos are sort of a joke club including the fact that the owner's son is mysteriously always on the team sheet. This latest Estudiantes "re-branding" is a response to their uninspiring fan-base and constant change in uniform and colors.

Note that a hint of bitterness has entered my thoughts above because even with all that, Tecos have reached some finals and actually won the league in the last 50 years, something Atlas as diabloingles notes, has not done and is unlikely to do (3 played, 3 lost).

At the end of week four Tecos / Estudiantes still have no points, but didn't play this week.
They were due to play Chivas who have Libertadores commitments...

Good news - of sorts - for Rojinegro as Atlas finally get under way, rescuing a point away to America.
Atlante also drew for their first point.

Toluca were held 1 - 1 at home by Tigres, 89th minute penalty to the visitors ensured Toulca still haven't won this time round.

Santos won again, Benitez once more scoring the goal in a 1 - 0 over Chiapas.
'Pony' Ruiz is back at Santos this season after 3 years at Tecos.
38 and still going strong.

Monterrey beat Pumas 5 - 2 and are 2nd in the table, followed by Cruz Azul who beat Pachuca 4 - 1.
This brought about the first sacking of the season, Pachuca saying goodbye to Guillermo Rivarola.

4 teams are unbeaten still:
Santos are now 4 from 4.
Monterrey have 3 wins and 1 draw
Puebla 2 wins and 2 draws
Chivas 1 win and 1 draw with 2 games in hand.

Week 5 sees things starting to take shape...

Santos stay top despite losing their 100% record.
They were beaten 1 - 0 at Tigres.
Santos' keeper Osvaldo Sanchez had a bit of a moan about Tigres' 'negative tactics' in getting the win.
They stopped Santos getting a shot on goal for the entire match by the sounds of it.
Not sure what Sanchez expected Tigres to do when faced with with a team that scored 12 and conceded 1 in 4 games, but defend and counter attack seems the obvious tactic to me.

Cruz Azul are second after winning 2- 3 against Jaguares, thanks to a Christian Gimenez hat trick.

Both Puebla and Chivas lost, so now only Monterrey are unbeaten.

Chivas lost at Atlante in a match with a crazy start.
Chivas took the lead after about 20 seconds. Within a minute they were down to 10 men after a direct red card for Edgar Mejia.
Atlante then equalised in the 3rd minute, going on to win 2 - 1.

Estudiantes (Tecos) finally got their first points, winning 3 - 2 against San Luis in the Friday night game.

Atlas are still winless after losing 0 - 1 to Toluca after a last minute goal by Sinha.
Sorry for Rojinegro, but hopefully this will be the turning point in Toluca's tournament....

Two more coaches have gone this week.
Carlos Ischia has left Atlas after their bad start and 'Chelis' Sola has left Puebla.
This is due to a continued internal dispute between the two major shareholders - Francisco Bernat and Ricardo Henaine.
There's been a lot of trouble at Puebla this week.
Bernat was arrested and has agreed to hand over his shares to Henaine after accusations of blackmail. 'Chelis' has walked in support of Bernat.
Puebla / Bernat is a long, on-going saga.
I think WSC has covered it before.
When I go to Mexico in Sept, I'll try to get some more details.

I was trying to put the postion table so far in, but it's proving too much trouble for my simple brain!

To increase their misery, Pumas beat Puebla 4-1 in a match that failed to hold my interest.

Santos look to be the class of the league by some margin, with their opening week loss to Tigres looking more like a fluke every day.

Jaguares probably deserved a win or draw against Cruz Azul, but I'll take it!



(Of course, they lost to Toronto in a CCL match.)

I had both Pumas v Puebla and Morelia v Necaxa running on myp2p.
Neither of them held my interest to be honest.

Pumas have been a bit erratic so far, haven't they?
Won 3 at home, lost 2 away.
10 scored, 11 conceded.

Santos lost to Tigres this weekend, not the first week - but it still looks like just a glitch.
They've been on good form in the CONCACAF Champions League too....

Hmmmm. Chiapas as a boiling cauldron. Not sure that I've seen that trope before.

I have to say, if I hadn't nailed my colours to Pumas' mast 30 years ago, the demented rabbit could have led me to be a Cementero.

And yeah, I'd say schizophrenic more than erratic. To be truthful, I didn't expect Pumas to be even this good, given all of the guys they lost.

What Pumas lacks in demented hares it makes up for in logo design.

By the way, did anybody watch the Cruz Azul-Real Salt Lake game last night? (I couldn't find a CONCACAF CL thread.)

I didn't see the game, but the MLS fans in my Twitter feed were going bonkers.

I didn't see it either, but the highlights are on the CONCACAF website

www.concacafchampions.com/page/CL/Home/0,,12856,00.html

It looked like a mad one in the pouring rain

The website actually shows some (if not all) of the matches live.
Just need to register....
They had Toluca's 4 - 0 win over Olimpia on the other night.

Cruz Azul vs. Tigres today. Tigres shut down Santos last weekend--can they stop Cruz Azul also?

Not much going on in Primera Division at the moment because of the international matches, etc...most clubs have opted for friendlies against lower league teams, their youth squads, etc.

But tonight Chivas play Tecos in their new stadium - this is a postponed match because of their Copa Libertadores participation.
It's going to be the first full house in the Omnilife.
They decided to sell all seats at 20 pesos (£1)and it's had the desired effect.
I think the cheap seats are normally about 5 times that.

It's had a knock on effect with ticket sales for last night's friendly with Ecuador though.
Tickets for that started at 250 pesos and the stadium was probably just about half full.
Too expensive really, with Andres Guardado even saying the price put him off buying tickets for his friends and family.

Mexico were pretty poor last night and were lucky to only lose 1 - 2.
Conceding a goal after 30 seconds is not really a good start and it didn't get much better from there.
Guillermo Ochoa was in form (as ever) in goal and saved at least 3 certain goals.
Carlos Vela was, at best, average and really needs to be dropped.
He missed another sitter from 10 metres and just doesn't look like he can find the back of the net in a Mexico shirt.
Javier Orozco replaced him for the last half hour and was better, nearly setting up an equaliser.
The temporary coach Efrain Flores played a 3-4-3 which was just never going to work.
The back 3 were pulled apart at will.
Carlos Salcido was given no chance to run down the flank and get crosses and shots in till about the last 15 minutes when they changed things around a bit.
Then he had one great shot pushed onto the bar and, a few minutes later robbed the ball near the corner flag, sent in a cross which should have been converted but wasn't.
Barrera was quiet, Dos Santos tried but couldn't provide, Chicharito had one good chance but put his header over the bar from 6 metres.
All in all Ecuador were the better side and just didn't give Mexico time to play.

On Tuesday night Mexico face Colombia in Monterrey.
Hopefully Flores will change the system.


Meanwhile, Guille Franco has retired from international football to general disinterest.
He's stepping aside to give the youngsters a chance apparently.
He is currently looking for a club after being released by West Ham and, in all honesty, was never going to keep Chicharito out of the team again.

Necaxa have replaced Omar Arellano with Daniel Brailovsky - 4 coaches changed in 6 weeks throughout the division now.

Possibly the best story I found so far involves Tigres coach Ricardo 'Tuca' Feretti.
He was Pumas coach until recently and seems to have had a bit of trouble with a Pumas fan in Monterrey.
The lad and Tuca had a war of words after a training session on Friday. Only the fence between them stopped it coming to blows.
Tigres player Jose Castro joined in, basically tell the lad to 'go and get a job you shithead' or something very similar.
Tuca dragged Castro away and then tried to get the Tigres fans nearby to set about the Pumas fan.
'Come on, are you not Tigres? Go and sort him out' or words to that effect with swearing involved....
Not big, not clever, but amusing enough when there's no actual football going on.

I think Carlos Vela really needs to be dropped. He's been pretty poor for Mexico and he obviously never plays for Arsenal (will he ever?). There's been whispers he parties too much, Ronaldinho style so who knows if he's head in the right place.

Gio Dos Santos' quality shines through usually, but his end product has been really disappointing specially in South Africa.

Overall, yesterday's performance was pretty crap overall though Ecuador has a good team. I wouldn't be surprised if they had a good Copa America and get to Brazil 2014.

Well, after Tuesday night's 1 - 0 win over Colombia, things are definitely not all well with El Tri.
The whole team received a fairly universal slagging off in the press - especially Carlos Vela.
He came on as a second half sub for Dos Santos and apparently just didn't look like he even wanted to be there.

I say apparently because I didn't get to see the game as I was being dragged around a fucking shopping centre on the outskirts of Toluca looking for birthday presents for my son and his cousin.
However by all accounts my time was better spent that way than watching the match.

Shame though because I missed the debut of Toluca's Antonio Rios (Newcomer of The Tournament last season).
Seems he wasn't any better than the rest of them, but he played the full ninety minutes and, since Toluca's championship winning squad seem to get overlooked for the national team, it would have been nice to seem him there...

There is now a minor scandal going on because the squad held a bit of a piss - up in the team hotel in Monterrey after the game.
Apparently one of the England-based players paid for some extra rooms on his credit card so anyone felt who the urge could get it on with the female hangers-on.
Who'd have ever thought it? 'Footballers have drunken exploits with groupies' shock... it'd never happen in England, huh??!!

Back to Carlos Vela.
He's getting it from all angles in the press and from ex-players here.
They say he's jealous of Chicharito's success - both on the field at Man U and off the field with the ladies, he's got too big for his boots especially considering he's not really come up with goods on the field in an Arsenal or Mexico shirt, etc, etc.

Meanwhile, domestically speaking, after getting beaten by Chivas on Sunday night, Tecos have sacked Miguel 'Piojo' Herrera (5 coaches out of 18 gone now) and replaced him with Eduardo Acevado.
This is his 3rd shot at the job, having also been Tecos' coach in 2003 and 2005.

Tomorrow sees the league in action again with Necaxa at home to Toluca in the Friday evening game.
Toluca should get the 3 points as they're finally on the up but Necaxa have a new coach so who knows?
I'll be in Xalapa so hope to catch it on TV.

On Saturday, Santos visit Queretaro and Cruz Azul are away to Atlas so the top 2 should continue their good form.

Also on Saturday is the fixture of the week - el clasico regiomontano - Tigres v Monterrey.

Should be good to get back to action on the pitch after all the problems with the national team and no league football for nearly a fortnight....

The Cruz Azul hare is really exploring his dark side this week:

So they have Necaxa next week, eh?