Match preview: Santos Laguna vs. León

Game: Club Santos Laguna S.A. de C.V. vs. Club León

Date: Thursday, August 18th

Time: 8:05 p.m. Eastern, 7:05 p.m. Central, 5:05 p.m. Pacific, 12:05 a.m. UTC

Venue: Estadio Corona TSM (Torreón, Coah.)

Referees: REF: Victor Alfonso Caceres Hernandez, AR1: Enríque Isaac Bustos Díaz, AR2: Leonardo Javier Castillo Rodríguez, 4TH: Guillermo Pacheco Larios, VAR: Erick Yair Miranda Galindo, AVAR: Martín Molina Astorga

Television: United States - FOX Deportes Network, FS1; Mexico - TUDN, Azteca 7

Streaming: fuboTV (Subscription), Sling TV (Subscription), FOX Sports app, VIX+ (Mexico)

All-time record: León holds the all time, with 20 wins to Santos’ 16 and the clubs sharing 12 draws across all competitions. All of these results have come in Liga MX play except for one draw and one León win, which happened during the 1987-88 season of the Segunda División.

The last time the clubs met they ended in a 1-1 draw in Torreón back on April 24 on goals from Eduardo “Mudo” Aguirre and Ángel Mena.

Photo by Manuel Guadarrama/Getty Images

One of the good things about a doble jornada is that there isn’t much time to dwell on the past. Santos will look to use that to their advantage as they try and move past a poor performance against Tigres by hosting León tonight. León too will be eager to move past a 3-0 loss at home to Mazatlán.

While Tigres has historically had Santos’ number in Monterrey, Santos was shut out for just the second time all season. They’ll return home where they’ve scored ten goals in four games while conceding just four, including back-to-back shutouts against Atlas and Cruz Azul.

Of concern however is the status of captain and center back Matheus Dória. According to the TUDN broadcast of the Tigres match, Dória saw a specialist in Monterrey for his injured right ankle and it is unlikely he’ll play. Look for Santos to continue to rely on Félix Torres and Hugo Rodríguez as the center back pairing until Dória is fully fit.

Photo by Leopoldo Smith/Getty Images

León hasn’t been very good on the road this season, conceding seven goals and getting just five points out of a possible twelve. In fairness, they haven’t been very good at home either, conceding nine goals and getting just four out of a possible twelve points.

One bright spot however has been Lucas Di Yorio, who has four goals in his first eight games in the league after moving on loan from Everton de Viña del Mar in Chile. Di Yorio however hasn’t scored since Week 3, and no one else has more than one goal on the club. They’ll need to figure something out, and against one of the better goalkeepers in the league.

The doble jornada also tends to have a way of evening things out for teams too. So while León has struggled and Santos has done well at home, there are no guarantees, especially on short rest with another quick turnaround coming.