Mexico drawn in Group C of 2019 Toulon Tournament

Mexico was drawn in Group C of the 2019 Toulon Tournament as it hopes for a repeat performance of last year’s tournament, where it finished in second place. Mexico will share the group along with Bahrain, Ireland and China. The tournament will have the same format as the one in 2018, which means that only the group winners are guaranteed a place in the Semifinals, while the best second-place finisher out of all three groups will round out the final four. Mexico has still not said which team it will send but it will most likely be the U-22 team, as they prepare for the Olympic qualifiers later this year.

Mexico’s group will resemble somewhat the one they faced in 2018. Mexico will face a Middle Eastern team (Qatar in 2018, Bahrain in 2019), a British Isles team (England in 2018 , Ireland in 2019) and China. They will also have the same order of games as last times. Mexico will open the tournament against Bahrain on June 3rd. They will then face Ireland, who should be the toughest team in the group, on June 6th, and just like last year, they will close things with China on June 9th.

We will have to wait to see if coach Jaime Lozano (should the U-22 team be the one to play the tournament) doesn’t do the same mistake coach Marco Antonio Ruiz did in 2018 and rotates the players in order to avoid fatigue, something the severely hindered Mexico last time. Mexico will have a tough task, and although it’s not as strong of a group as last year’s, it could be a tougher tournament with teams like Portugal, Brazil, France and current three-time champs England all waiting in the horizon for a semifinal clash.