Chile, Mexico Play to Draw in MexTour Exhibition

For the last eighteen years the MexTour has hosted matches between the National Team of Mexico against rival national teams at sites throughout the United States.  The friendly exhibition matches help prepare the national team teams for important competitions like the FIFA World Cup and Concacaf Gold Cup, while also raising soccer awareness in the US. 

This year the Mexico’s Mens National Team (El Tri) came to Austin for the first time to face the two-time Copa American Champion Chile (La Roja) at Q2 Stadium as part of the tour. The teams played to a 2-2 draw before an announced capacity crowd.  This is the fourth international match hosted at Q2 Stadium since opening earlier this year. 

Austin, with its large Mexican-American population, was cheering for El Tri.  The banging drums, waving of the Mexican flag and the cultural dress gave the match a festival like atmosphere. And the majority of the 17,202 fans erupted when forward Santiago Gimenez scored the first goal of the match for El Tri. 

La Roja tied the game in the 21st minute on a goal by Ivan Morales.  But Mexico responded in the 61st minute on Jordan Silva’s header off a free kick to go ahead 2-1.  However, Chile scored the equalizer in the 86th on a shot near the top of the box by Pablo Parra. 

“It was an intense atmosphere,” Aaron Dominguez told a reporter from the Austin Amerian Statesman. “It’s very exciting to see Mexico play in-person and the fans had a lot of passion, which is what you’d expect to see.”