Martino explains his decision to include Raúl Jiménez in Mexico’s World Cup squad
The Mexico coach gave an updates on the Wolves forward, who he is says is making good progress from his injury.
The Qatar World Cup will kick off in five days’ time but Mexico have one more friendly game to prepare for the tournament. They face Sweden on Wednesday - a game which will give Gerardo Martino one last chance to fine-tune his team before their World Cup debut against Poland. One of the most talked about issues is the fitness of striker Raúl Jiménez, who has chosen to go to the tournament even though he hasn’t played for the last few months.
In his press conference head of the Sweden friendly, Tata Martino spoke about why he included a player whose fitness is unknown in his squad list. The Argentine coach explained that the striker has been improving in a positive way and may be given minutes on-field against the Swedes.
“We made the decision based on how the player was evolving from his injury. We spoke to him, and with the medical staff and we reached a point where we only need to know how well he responds in training. That will gives us an indication as to how he would cope in full competition. He hasn’t played competitively yet although he has played in practice matches with us and he responded well. Tomorrow, he will surely play some minutes of the game,” Martino told reporters.
The Mexico coach also thanked the players who did not make the final list. “Sincere thanks to the four players for everything they have done for us - the predisposition of both Jesús (Angulo) and Erick (Aguirre) to join us almost right at the beginning of all this and fight while knowing they had few possibilities of making the list; and that of Santi (Giménez) and Diego (Lainez) - that they came here knowing that they were not in the list is only worthy of gratitude,” he added.
The duel game Sweden and Mexico will be played on Wednesday at 1:30 p.m. (Central Mexico time). The friendly bring Mexico’s preparation for the World Cup to a close. Martino’s men will debut in the World Cup on 22 November against Poland, and will later face Argentina and Saudi Arabia.