Jennifer Stewart-USA TODAY Sports
This time last year, Leon rode the wave of promotion from Mexico‘s second division with a fine start to the Liga MX Apertura 2012 tournament. This year, it is Veracruz who have surprised with a great start to the Apertura 2013, their first tournament since their promotion to the Liga MX.
How is it that a club that was just promoted are at top of the league after four games with 10 points? One of the major reasons is because of how prolific attacking midfielder Angel Reyna has been, as he leads the league with seven goals.
Now, the fact that Reyna is playing at a high level isn’t out of character. Reyna is the classic talented player with discipline issues that prevented him from fully reaching his potential. In fact, his joining of Veracruz was seen as a last-ditch effort on the part of Reyna to prove his worth.
And prove his worth he has so far. Reyna has served as the player that the team can rely on to finish off successful counter attacks, given that Veracruz play a style of soccer which is very balanced but tilts towards a cautious approach.
While Reyna has been converting scoring chance, Veracruz have also made it to the top of the league thanks to the coaching of Juan Antonio Luna. ‘El Cabezon’, as he is known, coached this Veracruz team to a first-division promotion back when the club were playing in the second-division as Club La Piedad.
Luna has led a team which with multiple players on load and molded the players into what is now a team that has a clear idea how it plays. Because of it, the team has been able to overcome the apparent jump in quality by playing disciplined soccer, an approach that helped them gain the promotion.
Whether or not Veracruz will be able to sustain this fast start and hang onto one of the top eight spots to make it into the Apertura 2013 playoffs will remain to be seen. But thanks to the clinical finishing from Angel Reyna, with a little bit of old-fashioned solid teamwork to support him, Veracruz have been a pleasant surprise at the top of the table.
Lucas Carreras is a contributing Soccer writer for www.RantSports.com. You can follow Lucas on Twitter by following him @maldini3fan and you can add him to your circles on Google+.
