As Mexico continues their run in the Copa America Centenario, big news has come out for their other summer tournament in August as they look to defend their gold medal at the Rio Olympics. The Olympics is a U-23 team tournament but allows for three overage players to participate for each respective country. Mexico’s Olympic team has now taken a hit as it looks that PSV Eindhoven will now allow for Mexico captain Andres Guardado to play in Rio.
Dutch Champions say no
Because Guardado would be one of the three overage players, that would mean he would need permission from his club team to play in the Olympics. His club team, Dutch champions PSV won’t allow it. From the perspective of PSV, it makes sense to not allow one of their most important players to miss out on the first month of the season. One reason could be because how the dutch league title went down to the final day when they snatched the title from bitter rivals Ajax and the knowledge of every point are important will be fresh in the dutch club’s mind. Another reason is the chance of Guardado picking up an injury while he’s in Rio and return to Holland needing to miss even more time. Add to the fact that Guardado already will have played in this summer’s Copa America Centenario and has not had a summer off since the 2012 summer. Guardado has played for Mexico in 2013 in the Confederations Cup, 2014 in the World Cup, last year in the Gold Cup.
Joining the club
Guardado isn’t the first Mexican star who has not been allowed to participate in the Olympics because of their club. Earlier in the year Bayer Leverkusen shut down any possibility of Mexican goal scorer Javier Chicharito Hernandez to play in the tournament since he is also playing in the Copa America Centenario. Like with the situation with Guardado, Bayer has no reason to allow Hernandez to play in Rio since it will mean him missing the early stages of the season with the club having high hopes this coming year.
Defending champion struggles
Mexico’s U-23 team has struggled this year losing their first four matches, drawing one, and only winning one. Pressure will only build as Rio gets closer and talks about Mexico’s run to the gold increases. While there is young talent that has plenty of pro experience with Carlos Salcedo, Rodolfo Pizarro, and Erick Gutierrez all representing Mexico at the senior level at one point, the talent hasn’t resulted in victories this year. In contrast, the gold medal winning Mexico four years ago not only had a great Olympics but had a great build up including winning the Toulon Tournament earlier in the summer.
There are still plenty of options for Mexico to call up as their three overage players it’s becoming clear that in a year where European clubs can’t stop their Mexican players in participating in the Copa America, they are more than willing to put their foot down and stop them from playing in a second summer tournament and have their investments miss the beginning of the club season and risk injury.
