Miguel “Piojo” Herrera is officially out as head coach of Tigres. This was a move that had been speculated about right after his team was beat in the playoffs by the eventual champion Pachuca. Herrera may not have helped his case one bit by telling the press that he had and old roster and that was essentially the reason that they got bounced from the playoffs.
Hours after the Herrera news was made public we got wind of another developing story. Club Puebla announced that Nicolas Larcamon would no longer be coaching the team. It seems to be no coincidence that these two moves were made by both Puebla, and Tigres. All roads lead to Larcamon being the next head coach at Tigres. Before we move onto what a Larcamon lead Tigres team could look like though, we have to look at Miguel Herrera’s tenure. What went wrong? What would Larcamon, or whoever takes over this team need to do differently to obtain better results?
Did Things Really Go Wrong Under Herrera At Tigres?
Tigres is a team that had been used to winning as of late. Miguel Herrera was able to rack up multiple regular seasons over 30 points with the team. While of course, falling short during the playoffs. Anyone can point to the fact that Herrera was not able to win a championship with Tigres, and call his tenure a failure. However, the team had had trouble rejuvenating the squad even going back to the last days of Tuca Ferreti.
For his part Herrera tried to inject some youth into the squad with Cordova, whom he brought over from Club America. At the same time he made Raymundo Fulgencio a team regular. In many games Cordova found himself having to get back on defense to cover for Guido Pizzaro, and Rafael Carioca who are not that old, but they play really old!
That’s one of the things that’s an issue for Tigres even some of the players that shouldn’t be completely past their prime don’t look in decent enough physical shape to consistently compete. Jesus Angulo who came over from Atlas was also brought on to inject some youth into the squad. He hasn’t been as consistent as the team may have hoped he’d be. If we had to talk about Herrera’s “failure”, certainly the playoffs are what we could look at. Also he wasn’t able to find young players to fill key roles on the team.
Herrera’s Comments To The Media Did Not Sit Well With The Roster
The fact that Herrera is getting the ax today is a clear indication that most of the old heads in that Tigres locker room are going to be around for at least a little while longer. There’s no question that the team felt disrespected by Miguel’s comments about the team getting old. He had already mentioned before the Pachuca series that his team needed to run and get back on defense. Something that they had a lot of trouble doing in the series like he predicted.
What Type of A Team Is Larcamon Taking Over?
If Larcamon is the manager that is chosen to take over for Herrera he’s going to have to contend with two main issues. Number one are going to be the questions about his terrible final series with Puebla against Club America where his team got embarrassed.
The second issue that he’ll have to contend with is the same one that Herrera could not overcome. The team is getting old, but the leaders in that locker room still have preference in that front office. How do you rejuvenate the team without angering the old guys? It’s a tough spot to be in. Plus, Larcamon has never been under the type of pressure that he’ll be under in Monterrey with Tigres. Local media there is tough, and he’ll learn that quickly.
