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The ‘Spanish’ goalkeeper that the Mexican National Team is looking at

Alex Padilla is an Athletic Bilbao goalkeeper and may be considered by Diego Cocca in the World Cup preparation process.

México
Alex Padilla is an Athletic Bilbao goalkeeper and may be considered by Diego Cocca in the World Cup preparation process.
EFE

The latest target for the Mexican National Team is to plan a strong successor for Guillermo Ochoa. Luckily for them, Diego Cocca has already got somebody in mind. The searchlight has, it seems, flown over both Carlos Acevedo and Luis Malagón, instead landing on the head of the Athletic Bilbao goalkeeper, Alex Padilla.

According to information from Jóvenes Futbolistas MX, the national team coach has the goalkeeper of The Lions in his sights and has planned to convince him to choose the three colours of green, white and red (which, incidentally, are similar enough to Athletic’s club colours). It should be remembered that Padilla has Mexican nationality through his mother, although he was born in Spain.

Diego Cocca took over from Tata Martino after the failure of the 2022 World Cup.
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Diego Cocca took over from Tata Martino after the failure of the 2022 World Cup.RAQUEL CUNHAREUTERS

The Mexican plays for the Bilbao youth team

The only way for Alex Padilla to play definitively for El Tri is for him to have minutes with the senior team. With this, a hypothetical call up from Spain would be ruled out completely.

In fact, the 19-year-old could be called up by the team as they represent Mexico at the Maurice Revello tournament (an invite-only youth international tournament) and thus get a more concrete idea of his style of play as well as the sense of camaraderie with his teammates. At the moment, the Mexican is a starter for Bilbao Athletic (the B team), although he has been on the bench for the first team on a few occasions.