The league final was already considered uninteresting by audiences when suddenly the media focused on Torreón ’s Ángeles Hospital, and not on Press Day . The reason: Star player Andrés Guardado , from the Real Betis F.C ., was admitted at the hospital for a quick operation, which considerably diverted attention from what Robert Dante Siboldi and Hernán Cristante said during Press Day.
The main challenge that both Toluca F.C. and Santos F.C. face is to win the championship, but there is also a side goal they want to achieve: Breaking a record that Tigres F.C. and Rayados F.C. set five months ago, while the final was transmitted simultaneously by Azteca TV and Televisa .
The goal is 20.7 rating points for the first match, and 23.9 for the second, adding up audiences from both national TV channels, who will once again broadcast a soccer final through simulcast.
They certainly have the tools to break the record. Santos F.C. increased its value when defeating the last league champion and, more recently, America , the arrogant football club that suffered a shameful defeat by the team from Torreón. Santos F.C. is most likely to win -at least tonight-, and could even be considered the audience’s favorite.
Both teams are equally tenacious, which is why the irresponsible and immature spokesmen and commentators from other popular football clubs saying that this final is uneventful are just desperately yearning for attention. Everyone that enjoys this sport will surely be watching this final match attentively.
But in addition to that, the fact that a team from central Mexico that isn’t America F.C . or Pumas F.C. and a team from the north that isn’t Rayados F.C. or Tigres F.C. are playing for the league championship is very refreshing and worth pointing out. There have been five consecutive tournaments where at least one of these teams made it to the final, and although Toluca F.C. is to play their 11th final in the team’s history, they will play for the title for the first time in eight years. Santos did so recently, at the closing match of 2015 , when, with the help of Pedro Caixinha , they beat the team from Querétaro , despite the fact that they were playing with Ronaldinho .
This will be the third time in history that these two teams face off for the title of Mexican football . The first time was in summer of 2000 when Toluca beat Santos with a global score of 7 to 1 ; the second went to penalty kicks, but the team from the State of Mexico was victorious as well ( 2-2 and 4-3 , at the penalties). Santos can’t afford to lose another title to a football club that once belonged to the same company, Grupo Modelo . Santos and Toluca are prepared and willing to obliterate what has become a ridiculous convention, defended by a bunch of critics with an inferiority complex, who suggest that Mexican football is only interesting when certain teams are playing (Chivas F.C., America F.C., Cruz Azul F.C., or Pumas F.C).
English version by David Morales
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