The weekend in Europe was marred by a couple of injuries but it wasn’t all bad news for our Europeos.
The Good
- Gerardo Arteaga continues his in-form play for Genk. He added another assist and is now up to 4 assists on the season. The Santos product has started 6 of Genk’s last 7 games. Arteaga is only 22 years old and will be eligible for the Olympic team but I think Tata will want him with the full Senior National team this summer.
- Diego Lainez returned to the starting lineup for the first time since getting COVID earlier in the month. He lasted 60 minutes before being subbed off. He had a good active first half and impressed me with his tracking back to help his defense. It bodes well for him that his manager gave him the start even though he was likely not in a condition to go 90. Andres Guardado showed he still has something left in the tank. He dictated the Real Betis attack from the midfield and connected on 7/8 long balls in his 81 minutes of work.
- Porto was only able to get a draw versus Sporting but it wasn’t due to a lack of effort by Jesus Corona. Peep Tecatito’s stats above. He had 6 key passes and went 4/5 on dribbles in his 90 minutes. Porto remains 10 points behind Sporting for the league lead.
The Bad
- Injuries. Nestor Araujo tweaked his hamstring and had to be subbed out in the second half. He is a now a question mark for Mexico’s March friendlies as Celta expects him to miss a couple weeks. The same can be said for Omar Govea as well. He had to be subbed out in the first half of Zulte’s 2-1 win over Kortrijk.
The Ugly
- The end of the PSV/Ajax game was very testy with Ajax scoring a late penalty to grab an important point. After the penalty, the goal scorer and Ajax captain, Dusan Tadic, got into it with PSV captain, Denzel Dumfries. Apparently, Dumfries called him a pussy and that’s what kicked off the pleasantries. Regardless, PSV fans did not have to wait for Tadic and hit him with a coin. As for the game itself, Edson Alvarez got the start and went 57 minutes. Fellow Mexican International Erick Gutierrez had a 20 minute cameo off the bench.