Tigres’s Narrative-Busting Run Comes Up a Result Short in FIFA Club World Cup

Of all the narratives Tigres UANL was able to alter in its run to the FIFA Club World Cup final, there was one that remained inevitable and ironclad.

Bayern Munich captured its sixth trophy in the last season-plus by doing what most reigning European champions do in FIFA’s club championship. Its 1-0 win over its Mexican counterpart in Qatar on Thursday extended UEFA’s dominance and left Tigres one step short of history in a competition that’ll be expanded and restructured in 2022.

Prior to Tigres, no Concacaf club had ever reached the final. European clubs had won 12 of the 16 competitions all time, with all 12 coming in the last 13 editions. The only non-UEFA winners came from Brazil, with Brazilian clubs winning the first three before the 2012 surprise Corinthians sprung on Chelsea.

Tigres’s run was made all the more unlikely considering that the club was very nearly eliminated in the first round of the Concacaf Champions League, the region’s entryway into the CWC. It took a stoppage-time goal from its goalkeeper, Nahuel Guzman, to stave off an ouster at the hands of El Salvador’s Alianza. From there, it reached the quarterfinals, which took place over the course of nine months. The first leg vs. NYCFC was played in March, with Tigres winning away from home, 1-0. The second leg wasn’t played until December, with the pandemic forcing Concacaf to put the competition on pause and relocate the remainder to Orlando.

It was in Florida that Tigres rediscovered its mojo, dismantling NYCFC, 4-0, in the second leg and coasting by Honduras’s Olimpia, 3-0, in their one-off semifinal. It took a come-from-behind effort to outlast LAFC and secure the ticket to Qatar, with Gignac, naturally, scoring the decider. That 2-1 triumph cathartically ended a half-decade of frustration, with Tigres finishing as runner-up in three of the previous four CCL tournaments.

The narrative-busting continued in Qatar, where Tigres edged Asian champion Ulsan Hyundai and South American champion Palmeiras by one-goal margins–all goals scored by its iconic French striker, Andre-Pierre Gignac–to set up the showdown vs. mighty Bayern.

This wasn’t a full-strength Bayern, but when the financial imbalance between the two sides is what it is, that hardly alters the calculus. Nevertheless, Jerome Boateng was out of the final for personal reasons, Thomas Muller was ruled out after testing positive for coronavirus Thursday morning. Bayern was already without Leon Goretzka and Javi Martinez, who had tested positive prior to the competition and didn’t travel to Qatar.

With Mexican clubs having an 0-6-0 all-time record vs. European clubs entering Thursday’s final, the scales figured to be tilted in Bayern’s direction anyway, and the scoreboard nearly followed suit early. Joshua Kimmich laced a long-range shot into the far netting in the 18th minute, only to have it taken off the board by VAR after Robert Lewandowski, in an offside position, was deemed to have obstructed Guzman’s view.

Bayern continued to control the run of play throughout but only was given its opener in somewhat controversial circumstances. Lewandowski again appeared to be offside in the build-up to Benjamin Pavard’s goal in the 59th minute, and the assistant referee’s flag reflected that. Video review showed that Lewandowski’s arm and Tigres defender Carlos Salcedo’s heel were even, though, with the call on the field being overturned.

From there, it was a matter of a ruthless and deep machine finishing off the job, which Bayern did against a tiring opponent–one late Gignac half-chance notwithstanding. In addition to Bundesliga, Champions League, DFB Pokal, German Super Cup and UEFA Super Cup titles, Bayern can now claim to be a world champion, while Tigres will have to settle for being second-best after a spirited run and valiant final effort.

There is one narrative changed from a Concacaf standpoint. Bayern’s dynamic Canadian left back, Alphonso Davies, became the first Concacaf-based player to feature in and win the Club World Cup final. Mexican great Rafa Marquez (Barcelona), appeared in the 2009 semifinal but did not play in the final, while Julian Green (Bayern Munich) did not play in Bayern’s 2013 conquest and hadn’t committed to representing the USA until the spring of 2014 anyhow. New frontiers aren’t always conquered in one fell swoop, but the tide is turning on multiple fronts as it relates to North American accomplishments on the global stage. MLS clubs can only watch with envy, with the league still seeking its first entrant on the Club World Cup stage. Wednesday’s draw for the 2021 CCL set the roadmap to potentially get there.

As for Davies, there’s an appropriate photo that’s recirculated in the build-up to the final of him, in 2017, after the first leg of Tigres’s eventual ouster of the Vancouver Whitecaps in the Concacaf Champions League semifinals. Davies, who left Vancouver for Bayern in 2018, had swapped shirts with Gignac, who went onto score one goal in the 4-1 aggregate triumph for the Mexican side. 

At the time, Davies had yet to have his international breakthrough and was just a potential-filled player going up against a powerhouse. Three years later, with a bit of seasoning and exposure to a top environment, he’s in the conversation about being the best in the world at what he does. Concacaf’s top clubs aren’t quite there yet, nor does one strong showing by one club in an odd midseason competition signify the closing of a gap, but it does add another layer to the ever-changing narrative.