UPDATED: Miguel Herrera Fired (Developing)
2: 21 pm UPDATE: Ahead of the scheduled 3 pm press conference, ESPN Deportes’ John Sutcliffe has confirmed that Herrera has been fired.
Miguel Herrera, famous for his demonstrative style on the sideline during matches, is awaiting the decision of the Mexican Football Federation (FMF) over his fate. Despite winning the recently-concluded CONCACAF Gold Cup, securing Mexico a chance to qualify for the 2017 Confederations Cup, a dark cloud was cast over the win for Mexico when Herrera was accused of punching a reporter from TV Azteca at the Philadelphia airport.
The airport incident has also been exacerbated somewhat by tweets made by the dos Santos brothers Gio and Jonathan that seemed to confirm that some sort of confrontation did occur. Those tweets have since been deleted, but screenshots can be easily found.
Giovani y Jonathan Dos Santos felicitan al Piojo por agresiones y borran Tweet http://t.co/lWvT13G6KF pic.twitter.com/RYYFoJ7GMY
— Carlos Torres 🇲🇽 (@CarlosTorresF_) July 27, 2015
The FMF convened a meeting on Tuesday morning to decide on the future of Herrera, and it is widely expected that he will be dismissed, per a violation of the FMF Ethics Code:
“Any person that holds a position or fulfills an activity directly or indirectly related to FMF and federated football, adheres to the principles and obligations within the current Code of Ethics, therefore, cannot argue lack of knowledge or non-existence of judicial interest as a defense adopting beginning or commencement of activities, with dignified conduct, authentic and integral that will avoid infringing on the principles within this Code.”
@FMF silent so far on Miguel Herrera's spat with a TV commentator yesterday morning in Philadelphia. Should be a reaction today.
— ESPN FC Mexico (@ESPNFCtri) July 28, 2015
Medios de comunicación esperan la postura de la FEMEXFUT sobre el caso de Miguel Herrera pic.twitter.com/EwzcQ1Eb5i
— DANIEL GAMEZ (@DANGAMEZ) July 28, 2015
Assuming the position in November of 2013 when the Mexican national team was in a state of disarray following a managerial merry-go-round of 3 managers in the month before Herrera’s hiring, El Piojo (“The Louse”), as he is popularly known, righted the ship for Mexico and guided them to victory in a World Cup qualification playoff against New Zealand.
In Brazil, Mexico did well to advance from a fairly difficult group that included the host nation, and ultimately lost in the round of 16 following a controversial penalty call against the Netherlands. It was during the World Cup that Herrera gained fame for his sideline behavior, ranging from leaps of joy in celebration of goals to wild gesticulating with his whole body to give instructions to his team.
(developing story…….)
12:00 pm UPDATE: From the futbaltotal editor-in-chief, on-site at the FMF headquarters.
Reporters told to shoo off FMF premises; no press conference as neither Decio de María nor Herrera are in Mexico City.
— Eric Gomez (@EricGomez86) July 28, 2015
1:oo pm UPDATE: The FMF will be holding a press conference at 2:00 pm.
Decio de María ofrecerá conferencia de prensa a las 14:00 hrs. en las instalaciones de la FMF
— Israel Márquez (@seleccmexicana) July 28, 2015
1:55 pm UPDATE: That’s a 3:00 pm eastern time presser at FMF. Asked what the sense is among reporters on-site, futboltotal’s Eric Gomez stated the following:
@DTang0426 3 PM ET, sense is that it can go either way.
— Eric Gomez (@EricGomez86) July 28, 2015
2:08 pm UPDATE: ESPN Mexico’s John Sutcliffe has tweeted confirmation that Miguel Herrera is no longer the manager.
Confirmado @MiguelHerreraDT ya dejo de ser técnico @miseleccionmx
— John Sutcliffe (@espnsutcliffe) July 28, 2015
3:08 pm UPDATE: The FMF press conference has begun, and General Secretary Decio de Maria has announced the Herrera has been fired.
Decio de Maria: Miguel Herrera understood the decision.
— ESPN FC Mexico (@ESPNFCtri) July 28, 2015
Decio de Maria highlighting that there are certain values that a Mexico national team coach has to live up to.
— ESPN FC Mexico (@ESPNFCtri) July 28, 2015
Decio de Maria not giving any names of possible replacements.
— ESPN FC Mexico (@ESPNFCtri) July 28, 2015
Decio de Maria: I've not spoken to the players. There wasn't enough time.
— ESPN FC Mexico (@ESPNFCtri) July 28, 2015
Speculation will now turn to the question of whom the FMF will approach for the job. As yet, no interim manager has been named, and with de Maria stating that there has been no decision made yet about whether to approach a Mexican coach or a foreign coach, there are plenty of question marks about the next steps for this team. Pedro Caixinha, Ricardo Feretti, former manager Victor Vucetich, and even Marcelo Bielsa and Jorge Sampaoli are some the names being bandied around by observers. There is little time to waste, as the playoff against the United States comes up in just over 10 weeks.
