Another U.S.-Mexico 'Clasico' at Azteca

Adam Spangler at This Is American Soccer is already in Mexico City for Wednesday’s World Cup qualifier between the U.S. and Mexico. Before he left, he pulled together a clasico tourist guide to the capital, with which its high altitude and the forbidding confines of Estadio Azteca has been a graveyard for the Americans.

What will it take for the U.S. to finally win a game there?

Can the Yanks do it with just a short time in the thin air beforehand?

Landon Donovan says he’s not going to settle for a point. But he can’t be the only one to show up.

If you want to watch the match in English from your home in the United States, good luck with that. A local friendly watering hole might be your best bet.

It’s probably too much to ask CONCACAF to step in and prevent greedy media corporations for putting fans over the barrel like this. And not just Telemundo. ESPN says the Spanish language network’s charge for English-language rights was prohibitive but didn’t elaborate.

With all the attention — and money — ESPN has been paying to highly-watched but meaningless friendlies involving European club teams, and its new deals to show matches from the Spanish Liga, German Bundesliga and English Premier League, U.S.-Mexico just doesn’t rate all that highly right now.

If Mexico loses this match, its chances of reaching the World Cup will be severely dented. That would really affect the bottom line of the Mexican media monopolists.

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