Football in Mexico

Men's football has been played in Mexico since the late nineteenth century, and professionally since 1943. Pachuca was the first football club founded in Mexico, which was established in 1892.^[8] Liga MX Femenil was the first women's professional football league, starting in the Apertura 2017.^[9][10] The development of women's football has occurred in waves since the 1950s.^[11]

Since 1996, the season is divided into two short tournaments (Apertura and Clausura) with a final knockout phase in each tournament, known as liguilla. This system is common throughout Latin America.^[12] From 1996 to 2002, the two short tournaments of the regular phase was named "Verano" and "Invierno".

Liga MX formerly named Liga Mayor and Primera División de México changed the names of the tournaments in 2002, and opted for the names Apertura and Clausura. The Apertura tournament is played from July to December, while the Clausura tournament is played from January to May.

Mexican football system has four divisions in the following order of competition level: Liga MX, Liga de Expansión MX, Liga Premier, and Liga TDP. Since 2020, the promotion and relegation has been suspended until 2026–27.

The most successful clubs in Liga MX are América with 16 titles, Guadalajara and Toluca with 12 titles each, Cruz Azul with 9 titles, León and Tigres UANL with 8 titles each.^[4] The most successful clubs in Liga MX Femenil are Tigres UANL with 7 titles, Monterrey with 4 titles, América and Guadalajara with 2 titles each. Both final matches in the first season set new world records for attendance at a women's football league match with 32,466 fans in attendance at the Apertura final^[13] and 51,211 at the Clausura final match.^[14]

The top three most popular football clubs on social media from North America, as of 25 March 2021, are all Mexican clubs.^[15] Note that this was before the arrival of Lionel Messi at Inter Miami, which resulted in 12.5 million Instagram followers for Inter Miami in 2023.^[16]

The Mexico national football team has qualified for the FIFA World Cup eighteen times and has qualified consecutively since 1994, reaching the quarter-finals twice (1970 and 1986) both as hosts, and reaching the round of 16 at seven consecutive editions. Mexico has hosted the World Cup three times (1970, 1986, and 2026).^[20][21] Mexico won the 1999 FIFA Confederations Cup as hosts, defeating Brazil 4–3, becoming the only non-European or South American team to have won an official global competition organized by FIFA for senior national teams.

Mexico is the most successful CONCACAF team, winning 15 continental titles (13 CONCACAF Championship/Gold Cup titles, one CONCACAF Nations League and one CONCACAF Cup). The team finished as runners-up twice in the Copa América (1993 and 2001), and also finished in third place three times (1997, 1999 and 2007).

The under-23 has been Olympic medalists twice, winning the gold medal at the 2012 Olympic Games in London, defeating Brazil 2–1, and winning the bronze medal at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, defeating the hosts Japan 3–1.

The under-20 team finished as world runners-up in 1977, and also finished in third place in 2011. The under-17 team has been world champions twice (2005 and 2011), and also finished as runners-up twice (2013 and 2019).

Players from Mexico have joined teams in Europe, including Jared Borgetti, Rafael Márquez, Gerardo Torrado, Cuauhtémoc Blanco, Nery Castillo, Carlos Salcido, Ricardo Osorio, Pável Pardo, Andrés Guardado, Guillermo Franco, Carlos Vela, Giovani dos Santos, Omar Bravo, Aaron Galindo, Héctor Moreno, Francisco Javier Rodríguez, Francisco Fonseca, Javier Hernández, Pablo Barrera, Efraín Juárez, Guillermo Ochoa, Jesús Corona, Héctor Herrera, Miguel Layún, Raúl Jiménez, Marco Fabián, Diego Reyes, Hirving Lozano, Edson Álvarez, Alexis Vega, Diego Lainez and Santiago Giménez the most recents.

The Mexico women's national football team was officially formed in 1991 to compete in the 1991 CONCACAF Women's Championship, its first appearance in the World Cup was in 1999. The team finished in third place in the 1970 unofficial World Cup held in Italy,^[11][22] and also finished as runners-up in the 1971 unofficial World Cup as hosts, with an estimated 110,000 people attended the final at Estadio Azteca.^[23]

Football was introduced to Mexico by emigrant miners from Cornwall and other parts of the United Kingdom at the end of the 19th century.^[8] In the early 1900s, football was used as a method to "indoctrinate modern labor practices" such as teamwork and competition within a set of rules upon the Mexican workers.^[24] In 1902, a five-clubs league emerged with a strong English influence.^[25][26] Many of the early football clubs were affiliated with corporations.^[27]

The first amateur league created in Mexico was the Liga Mexicana de Football Amateur Association in 1902, organized by the Asociación de Aficionados de México en la Liga de Football (English: The Mexico Amateur Association in the Football League).

The first football federation in Mexico was founded in 1922, named Federación Mexicana de Football Asociación, and the following year changed its name to Federación Central de Fútbol. The current Federación Mexicana de Fútbol (FMF) was established in 1927 and later affiliated with FIFA in 1929.

Stadiums with a capacity of 40,000 or higher are included.

More information #, Stadium ...

#	Stadium	Capacity	City	State	Team(s)	Surface	Year opened	Owner	League division	Image
1	Azteca	81,070	Tlalpan	Mexico City	América, Cruz Azul, Mexico national team	Grass	1966	Grupo Televisa	Liga MX
2	Olímpico Universitario	69,000[28]	Coyoacán	Mexico City	UNAM	Grass	1952	UNAM	Liga MX
3	Jalisco	55,020[29]	Guadalajara	Jalisco	Atlas, UdeG	Grass	1960	Clubes Unidos de Jalisco	Liga MX, Liga de Expansión MX
4	BBVA	51,348[30]	Guadalupe	Nuevo León	Monterrey	Grass	2015	FEMSA	Liga MX
5	Cuauhtémoc	47,417	Puebla City	Puebla	Puebla	Grass	1968	State of Puebla	Liga MX
6	Akron	46,232	Zapopan	Jalisco	Guadalajara	Grass	2010	Grupo Omnilife	Liga MX
7	Universitario	41,886	San Nicolás de los Garza	Nuevo León	UANL	Grass	1967	UANL	Liga MX

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The average attendance per top-flight football league season and the club with the highest average attendance:

Source: League page on Wikipedia

• Mexican Football Federation
• Mexico national football team
• Mexico women's national football team
• Mexican football league system
• Women's football in Mexico
• List of football clubs in Mexico
• List of Mexican football champions
• List of football clubs in Mexico by major honours won
• Mexican football clubs in international competitions