A trio of first half goals were sufficient to see El Tri past a CONCACAF Gold Cup quarter-final clash in Glendale.

Rogelio Funes Mori, Jonathan dos Santos and Orbelin Pineda all found the net, while a further two goals were disallowed for offside.

“The first half we had distractions, enormous distractions, so Mexico had that ease to score,” Honduras assistant coach and stand-in leader Arnold Cruz said. “In truth, we couldn’t find the path that we had talked about, that we had trained and we had researched.”

Honduras was without its head coach Fabian Coito, who is currently recovering from COVID in Houston.

“We were persistent,” Mexico coach Gerardo ‘Tata’ Martino said. “We were dedicated. We faced the same challenges we did in previous matches. In the first ten minutes, we had a one-on-one and didn’t score. We were dedicated, we were persistent, and that’s why after the ones we missed, we scored eventually and were calmer.”

Off the field, Martino remarked on the behaviour of the fans. In two of Mexico’s group stage games, CONCACAF’s anti-discrimination protocols were activated after supporters used a homophobic chant.

“I would have to thank everyone for the behaviour they had,” Martino said. “I can say that the development and the performance from the team has contributed to that.”

Now, Mexico has its eyes on a semi-final clash against either Canada or Costa Rica, and their coach wants to see the same determination from the team that he witnessed this evening.

“I think that today, [the effort] was clear because the opponent was very hard,” Martino said. “When you have a performance like today with such a hard, difficult and strong team, this is more significant. The team played very well. We have been growing throughout the competition. We deserved the victory.”