Football in Mexico

Football in Mexico
Estadio Azteca, the home of América, Cruz Azul and the Mexico national football team
CountryMexico
Governing bodyFederación Mexicana de Fútbol (FMF)
National teamMexico
NicknameEl Tri
First played1923
Clubs18 in Liga MX
National competitions
International competitions

The most popular sport in Mexico is association football, known as fútbol in Spanish language,[1][2] 73% of the Mexican population consider themselves football fans.[3] The top professional football leagues in the country are Liga MX for men and Liga MX Femenil for women.

In 1943, football became a professional men's sport in Mexico. Since then, the most successful men's club is América.[4] In 2016, the first women's professional football league was established in the country, starting with the 2017–18 season. It set new world records for attendances at women's professional football matches.[5][6] Since then, the most successful women's club is Tigres UANL.

Antonio Carbajal was the first player to appear in five World Cups, and Hugo Sánchez was named best CONCACAF player of the 20th century by IFFHS.

Mexico's largest capacity stadiums are Estadio Azteca, Estadio Olímpico Universitario and Estadio Jalisco. As of 2006, it was estimated that there were in the nation over 324,000 registered players and approximately 8,155,000 unregistered players.[7]

Professional clubs

Men's football has been played in Mexico since the late nineteenth century, and professionally since 1943. It is often claimed that Pachuca had the first soccer team in Mexico, although Orizaba contests this assertion! [8]As early as 1887, the employees of the General Offices of the Central in Mexico City expressed an interest in setting up a football club and in November 1891, a match was played at San Cristobal between ‘Pearson’s Wanderers’ (of the British construction firm S. Pearson & Sons) and the ‘San Cristobal Swifts’. The Puchuca club was founded was in 1892. Liga MX Femenil was the first women's professional football league, starting in the Apertura 2017.[9][10] The development of women's football has occurred in waves since the 1950s.[11]

Since 1996, the season is divided into two short tournaments (Apertura and Clausura) with a final knockout phase in each tournament, known as liguilla. This system is common throughout Latin America.[12] From 1996 to 2002, the two short tournaments of the regular phase was named "Verano" and "Invierno".

Liga MX formerly named Liga Mayor and Primera División de México changed the names of the tournaments in 2002, and opted for the names Apertura and Clausura. The Apertura tournament is played from July to December, while the Clausura tournament is played from January to May.

Mexican football system has four divisions in the following order of competition level: Liga MX, Liga de Expansión MX, Liga Premier, and Liga TDP. Since 2020, the promotion and relegation has been suspended until 2026–27.

The most successful clubs in Liga MX are América with 16 titles, Guadalajara and Toluca with 12 titles each, Cruz Azul with 9 titles, León and Tigres UANL with 8 titles each.[4] The most successful clubs in Liga MX Femenil are Tigres UANL with 7 titles, Monterrey with 4 titles, América and Guadalajara with 2 titles each. Both final matches in the first season set new world records for attendance at a women's football league match with 32,466 fans in attendance at the Apertura final[13] and 51,211 at the Clausura final match.[14]

The top three most popular football clubs on social media from North America, as of 25 March 2021, are all Mexican clubs.[15] Note that this was before the arrival of Lionel Messi at Inter Miami, which resulted in 12.5 million Instagram followers for Inter Miami in 2023.[16]

# Football club Country Followers
1 América Mexico 36 million
2 Guadalajara Mexico 13 million
3 Cruz Azul Mexico 6.6 million

Association football clubs by city/metro area

Liga MX is the most important and top level division in Mexico. Liga de Expansión MX (formerly Ascenso MX) is the second level division in Mexican football. The following table shows the teams of these leagues and the cities/metro areas they're based in.

Key to colors and symbols
Metro areas with 3 teams in league
Metro areas with 2 teams in league
Metro areas larger than 500,000 population without a team in these leagues
Region Metro area Population Liga MX (Top level) Liga de Expansión MX (Second level)
Central South Greater Mexico City 21,804,515 América

Cruz Azul

UNAM 		Atlante
North East Monterrey, Nuevo León 5,341,177 Monterrey

UANL
West Guadalajara, Jalisco 5,268,642 Atlas

Guadalajara 		UdeG

Tapatío
East Puebla-Tlaxcala, Puebla/Tlaxcala 3,199,530 Puebla
Central South Toluca, State of Mexico 2,353,924 Toluca
North West Tijuana, Baja California 2,157,853 Tijuana
North East León, Guanajuato 1,924,771 León
Central North Querétaro, Querétaro 1,594,212 Querétaro
North West Juárez, Chihuahua 1,512,450 Juárez
North West La Laguna, Coahuila/Durango 1,434,283 Santos Laguna
South East Mérida, Yucatán 1,316,088 Venados
Central North San Luis Potosí, San Luis Potosí 1,271,366 Atlético San Luis
Central North Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes 1,140,916 Necaxa
North West Mexicali, Baja California 1,049,792
North East Saltillo, Coahuila 1,031,779
Central South Cuernavaca, Morelos 1,028,589
North West Culiacán, Sinaloa 1,003,530 Sinaloa
West Morelia, Michoacán 988,704 Morelia
North West Chihuahua, Chihuahua (state) 988,065
East Veracruz, Veracruz 939,046
South East Cancún, Quintana Roo 934,189 Cancún
North East Tampico, Tamaulipas/Veracruz 927,379 Jaiba Brava
South West Acapulco, Guerrero 852,622
South West Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas 848,274
North East Reynosa, Tamaulipas 837,251
South East Villahermosa, Tabasco 833,907
East Xalapa, Veracruz 789,157
Central North Celaya, Guanajuato 767,104 Celaya
South West Oaxaca, Oaxaca 713,925 Oaxaca
North West Durango, Durango 688,697
East Pachuca, Hidalgo 665,929 Pachuca
Central North Irapuato, Guanajuato 592,953 [17]
East Tlaxcala–Apizaco, Tlaxcala 570,308 Tlaxcala
North West Ensenada, Baja California 561,375 [18]
North East Matamoros, Tamaulipas 541,979
East Poza Rica, Veracruz 521,530
North West Mazatlán, Sinaloa 501,441 Mazatlán
Central North Zacatecas-Guadalupe, Zacatecas 405,285 Zacatecas
North East Ciudad Victoria, Tamaulipas 349,688 UAT
North West La Paz, Baja California Sur 292,241 La Paz[19]
West Tepatitlán, Morelos 150,190 Tepatitlán

National teams

Main articles: Mexico national football team and Mexico women's national football team

The Mexico national football team has qualified for the FIFA World Cup seventeen times and has qualified consecutively since 1994, reaching the quarter-finals twice (1970 and 1986) both as hosts, and reaching the round of 16 at seven consecutive editions. Mexico won the 1999 FIFA Confederations Cup as hosts, defeating Brazil 4–3, becoming the only non-European or South American team to have won an official global competition organized by FIFA for senior national teams.

Mexico is the most successful CONCACAF team, winning 15 continental titles (13 CONCACAF Championship/Gold Cup titles, one CONCACAF Nations League and one CONCACAF Cup). The team finished as runners-up twice in the Copa América (1993 and 2001), and also finished in third place three times (1997, 1999 and 2007).

The under-23 has been Olympic medalists twice, winning the gold medal at the 2012 Olympic Games in London, defeating Brazil 2–1, and winning the bronze medal at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, defeating the hosts Japan 3–1.

The under-20 team finished as world runners-up in 1977, and also finished in third place in 2011. The under-17 team has been world champions twice (2005 and 2011), and also finished as runners-up twice (2013 and 2019).

Players from Mexico have joined teams in Europe, including Jared Borgetti, Rafael Márquez, Gerardo Torrado, Cuauhtémoc Blanco, Nery Castillo, Carlos Salcido, Ricardo Osorio, Pável Pardo, Andrés Guardado, Guillermo Franco, Carlos Vela, Giovani dos Santos, Omar Bravo, Aaron Galindo, Héctor Moreno, Francisco Javier Rodríguez, Francisco Fonseca, Javier Hernández, Pablo Barrera, Efraín Juárez, Guillermo Ochoa, Jesús Corona, Héctor Herrera, Miguel Layún, Raúl Jiménez, Marco Fabián, Diego Reyes, Hirving Lozano, Edson Álvarez, Alexis Vega, Diego Lainez and Santiago Giménez the most recents.

The Mexico women's national football team was officially formed in 1991 to compete in the 1991 CONCACAF Women's Championship, its first appearance in the World Cup was in 1999. The team finished in third place in the 1970 unofficial World Cup held in Italy,[11][20] and also finished as runners-up in the 1971 unofficial World Cup as hosts, with an estimated 110,000 people attended the final at Estadio Azteca.[21]

History

Football was introduced to Mexico by emigrant miners from Cornwall, United Kingdom at the end of the 19th century.[8] In the early 1900s, football was used as a method to "indoctrinate modern labor practices" such as teamwork and competition within a set of rules upon the Mexican workers.[22] In 1902, a five-clubs league emerged with a strong English influence.[23][24] Many of the early football clubs were affiliated with corporations.[25]

The first amateur league created in Mexico was the Liga Mexicana de Football Amateur Association in 1902, organized by the Asociación de Aficionados de México en la Liga de Football (English: The Mexico Amateur Association in the Football League).

The first football federation in Mexico was founded in 1922, named Federación Mexicana de Football Asociación, and the following year changed its name to Federación Central de Fútbol. The current Federación Mexicana de Fútbol (FMF) was established in 1927 and later affiliated with FIFA in 1929.

Stadiums

Stadiums with a capacity of 40,000 or higher are included.

# Stadium Capacity City State Team(s) Surface Year opened Owner League division Image
1 Azteca 81,070 Tlalpan Mexico City América, Cruz Azul, Mexico national team Grass 1966 Grupo Televisa Liga MX
2 Olímpico Universitario 69,000[26] Coyoacán Mexico City UNAM Grass 1952 UNAM Liga MX
3 Jalisco 55,020[27] Guadalajara Jalisco Atlas, UdeG Grass 1960 Clubes Unidos de Jalisco Liga MX, Liga de Expansión MX
4 BBVA 51,348[28] Guadalupe Nuevo León Monterrey Grass 2015 FEMSA Liga MX
5 Cuauhtémoc 47,417 Puebla City Puebla Puebla Grass 1968 State of Puebla Liga MX
6 Akron 46,232 Zapopan Jalisco Guadalajara Grass 2010 Grupo Omnilife Liga MX
7 Universitario 41,886 San Nicolás de los Garza Nuevo León UANL Grass 1967 UANL Liga MX

Attendances

The average attendance per top-flight football league season and the club with the highest average attendance:

Season Tournament League average Best club Best club average
2024–25 Clausura 21,548 Club América 44,821
2024–25 Apertura 20,105 Club América 42,702
2023–24 Clausura 23,342 Monterrey 43,356
2023–24 Apertura 20,651 Tigres 39,904
2022–23 Clausura 23,160 Monterrey 43,588
2022–23 Apertura 20,533 Tigres 40,831
2018–19 Clausura 22,680 Monterrey 42,505
2018–19 Apertura 22,896 Tigres 40,995
2017–18 Clausura 25,368 Monterrey 42,840
2017–18 Apertura 23,345 Monterrey 48,017
2016–17 Clausura 27,774 Monterrey 48,960
2016–17 Apertura 26,600 Monterrey 48,392
2015–16 Clausura 27,757 Monterrey 49,903
2015–16 Apertura 24,768 Monterrey 45,134

Source: League page on Wikipedia

See also

References

  1. ^ "Mexico Information - Page 2". World InfoZone. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  2. ^ Schechter, Daniel C.; Quintero, Josephine (2008). Mexico City. Con Pianta - Daniel C. Schechter, Josephine Quintero - Google Books. Lonely Planet. ISBN 9781740591829. Retrieved 1 April 2014.
  3. ^ "(Soccer) Football Fans by Country 2026". 4 April 2024.
  4. ^ a b "Mexico - List of Champions". Rec.Sports.Soccer Statistics Foundation. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  5. ^ "News Roundup: Union lose, Steel in, LAFC fail to impress, and USOC kicks off". The Philly Soccer Page. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  6. ^ "For Liga MX Femenil, an impressive start to an infant league • Copa90". Copa90. Archived from the original on 26 August 2018. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  7. ^ Dunmore, Tom (16 September 2011). Historical Dictionary of Soccer - Tom Dunmore - Google Books. Scarecrow Press. ISBN 9780810871885. Retrieved 1 April 2014.
  8. ^ a b Schwartz, Sharron (2026-03-09). "Mexico's "Little Cornwall", Cradle of Football". Cousin Jacks World. Retrieved 2026-03-10.
  9. ^ MX, LIGA MX / ASCENSO. "LIGA MX - Página Oficial de la Liga del Fútbol Profesional en México .: Bienvenido". www.ligamx.net (in Mexican Spanish). Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  10. ^ FIFA.com. "New horizons in the development of Mexican football". FIFA.com. Archived from the original on January 23, 2018. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  11. ^ a b L’Hoeste, H. Fernández; Irwin, R.; Poblete, J. (6 May 2015). Sports and Nationalism in Latin / o America. Springer. ISBN 9781137518002.
  12. ^ Fellerath, David. "A thought experiment: What would NASL's split-season plan look like this season?". Indy Week. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  13. ^ "Chivas wins inaugural Liga MX Femenil title". ESPN.com. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  14. ^ "Femenil final shows women's football is thriving in Mexico". ESPN.com. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  15. ^ "Digital impact of Latin American football teams". GSIC. 25 March 2021.
  16. ^ "Inter Miami surpasses Brazilian clubs and becomes the MLS team with the most followers on Instagram". 28 July 2023.
  17. ^ "Irapuato (Municipality, Mexico)". citypopulation.de.
  18. ^ "MEXICO: Metropolitan Areas". citypopulation.de.
  19. ^ "Club Atlético La Paz confirma su llegada a la Liga de Expansión MX". Soy Fútbol.
  20. ^ Kessel, Anna (4 June 2015). "Women's World Cup: from unofficial tournaments to record-breaking event". The Guardian. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  21. ^ "Mundial (Women) 1971". RSSSF. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  22. ^ Coerver, Don M.; Pasztor, Suzanne B.; Buffington, Robert (2004). Mexico: An Encyclopedia of Contemporary Culture and History - Don M. Coerver, Suzanne B. Pasztor, Robert Buffington - Google Books. Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 9781576071328. Retrieved 1 April 2014.
  23. ^ "Introduction". Federacion Mexicana de Futbol. Archived from the original on 11 October 2018. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  24. ^ "Mexico - List of Final Tables". Rec.Sports.Soccer Statistics Foundation. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  25. ^ Standish, Peter; Bell, Steven M. (2004). Culture and Customs of Mexico - Peter Standish, Steven M. Bell - Google Books. Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 9780313304125. Retrieved 1 April 2014.
  26. ^ "Estadio Olímpico Universitario". Archived from the original on 2016-05-12. Retrieved 2016-05-21.
  27. ^ "Football stadiums of the world – Stadiums in Mexico | Football stadiums of the world".
  28. ^ "Estadio BBVA (Estadio de Futbol de Monterrey) –". Stadiumdb.com. Retrieved 2022-08-22.
allikas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_football_in_Mexico