Emilio Lara returns to América’s youth ranks

Emilio Lara suffered a torrid night in Nicaragua in the first leg of the CONCACAF Champions Cup. The young right-back looked overwhelmed throughout and his mistakes enabled Real Estelí to take a 2-1 first leg lead against América. The youth player has since returned to the Águilas Under-23 team to continue his devlopment and has not participated with André Jardine’s first squad. It appears to be a technical decision - the 21-year-old defender will go back to work in a bid to earn a place in the first team again.

Lara needs to regain confidence

There have been other signs that perhaps Lara is not quite ready to make the leap to the next level. In the Week 5 of Clausura 2024 game against Rayados, Sergio Canales took advantage of a defensive mistake to level the score. Brazilian strategist André Jardine feels that the young full-back needs to regain confidence and gain valuable playing time that he certainly is not going to see with the senior side.

Everything indicates that the decision to drop the player down a category is because he simply isn’t ready. Lara was omitted for last night’s return leg against Estelí which Jardine’s team won 2-0 to book their place in the next round. Israel Reyes lined up alongside Igor Lichnovsky and Sebastián Cáceres in a three-man defence with Alex Zendejas and Cristián Calderón playing as wing-backs. Reyes is now above Emilio Lara in the pecking order and was deployed at right-back when Jardine played a flat back four in the last league game against León.

In the current campaign, Emilio Lara has racked up a total of 184 minutes in the Liga MX, spread over three games. He was in the initial line-up for two of them - he started and completed the opening day meeting against Xolos in Tijuana which the Águilas won 2-0 and also featured in the XI against Rayados - the penultimate league game in which he spent 77 minutes on-field. The previous week, he made a brief, 17-minute appearance in the 0-0 draw against Necaxa, coming on to replace Kevin Álvarez in the dying minutes. The 21-year-old made his top flight debut against Monterrey on 6 November 2021. Now he will have a new start and a lot of work ahead to regain the trust of Brazilian strategist André Jardine.

América have a busy week ahead with three games in the Liga MX - they visit Pachuca on Saturday, on Wednesday they host Mazatlán and the following Saturday they face Cruz Azul also at home in the Clásico Joven. The team currently sits second in the general table, level on 14 points with two teams - Rayados (top) and Tigres, in third.