Mexico chewed through 11 coaches in the nine years that followed their second-round exit at the 2006 World Cup. The result: successive second-round exits in South Africa and Brazil. Since his appointment in late 2015, Juan Carlos Osorio has presided over an exceptional period of stability and progress for El Tri. From the beginning he pledged to do things differently. Gone were the melodrama, nostalgia and hyperventilation traditionally associated with management of the Mexican national team; in their place Osorio, erudite and understated, offered innovation, meticulous preparation and a tactical flexibility that stayed true to Mexico’s tradition of musketeering football. The early results were promising. There was a long unbeaten streak in Osorio’s first six months in the job, as well as a semi-final appearance at last year’s Confederations Cup, and qualification for this World Cup – in a Hexagonal which the US men’s national team did everything in its power to turn into an effective Pentagonal – never looked in doubt. Planning for Russia was typically meticulous, involving cutting-edge sleep science, the assistance of a team psychologist, special mattresses, and a culinary regime built on the fortifying power of cherry juice and “tortillas that taste like glory”. The result: for the seventh World Cup in a row, Mexico have departed at the round of 16. Neither the chaos of the pre-Osorio era nor the stability that’s followed has allowed the Mexicans to break the fabled curse of el quinto partido. The quest for El Tri to carry a World Cup campaign into a fifth match continues.

This was, on paper at least, the strongest Mexico squad in years, perhaps ever, built around a spine of players – Guillermo Ochoa in goal, Hugo Ayala and Miguel Layun at the back, midfielder Andres Guardado, and the attacking duo of Javier Hernandez and Carlos Vela – who had all come up with the all-conquering under-17 side that won the 2005 world championship and were now in the prime of their careers.

Hirving “Chucky” Lozano promised youthful zest and unpredictability going forward, and for those who’d taken note of the young winger’s 17 goals for PSV Eindhoven last season, it was no surprise to see him brutalise Germany in El Tri’s opening match of this tournament. Lozano, all tireless running and lethal finishing, embodied the new hope of this Mexican side. It wasn’t simply Mexico’s commitment to attack at all costs that so impressed, it was the belief that seemed to consume the players as they flooded forward against a listless, uncommitted German defence: the belief that finally, after decades languishing in the middle of the food chain, they had the raw talent to take down the big beasts. Here, surely, was atonement for the humiliation of a 7-0 defeat to Chile in the quarter-finals of the 2016 Copa America. Here was vindication of all the tinkering Osorio had done in the buildup to the tournament, a vital riposte to the #FueraOsorio (“Fire Osorio”) hashtag haters on social media. Here was an upset to rank alongside Senegal v France in 2002 or the Netherlands’ scalping of imperial Spain four years ago. Here was proof that Mexico had arrived.

A comfortable victory against South Korea was enough to see Mexico’s many travelling fans abandon cries of #FueraOsorio in favor of a serenade, set to the tune of the ubiquitous Seven Nation Army, of “el profe Osorio”. A point against a rugged but unadventurous Swedish side in the final group match promised to be enough for El Tri to progress to the round of 16, and then: then Osorio froze. The great tinkerman, perhaps over-enthused by the waves of fan-love suddenly coursing his way, abandoned the instincts of a lifetime and sent out exactly the same starting XI to face Sweden as had overcome South Korea. It was to prove a calamitous mistake. The Mexicans seemed unsettled by the aerial threat and sheer size of the Swedes, but had few avenues to vary their approach. In the event, Korea’s miraculous defeat of Germany meant El Tri progressed regardless, but Osorio described the chastening 3-0 loss as an educational experience. “My sin was to be a purist, to think we can compete and beat a team who play the same type of football every weekend,” he said afterwards. “Hopefully one day I will get it right, that we play good football and can beat teams who play that way. This match has taught me a lot.”

A key part of the legend of Mexico’s World Cup curse is the quality of the opponents that have knocked El Tri out: Hristo Stoichkov’s Bulgaria in 1994, Germany in 1998, Argentina in 2006 and again in 2010, the Netherlands four years ago and Brazil in Russia. Of all the curse years it’s only against the US, in 2002, that El Tri have faced anything less than top-tier opposition in the round of 16. The match against Sweden offered a path to top the group and avoid Brazil in the second round. Mexico’s failure to get anything out of the Sweden match was, in retrospect, the undoing of their 2018 World Cup campaign.

If that defeat did teach Osorio a lot, we will have to wait to discover exactly what the lessons were. In Brazil Mexico faced an opponent much more suited to their style of play than the Swedes, but for all their dominance of possession and territory in the first-half they lacked a cutting edge in front of goal. Time and time again, pressing high and turning the ball quickly from defence into attack, they got players into good spaces but were excessively deliberate with the final ball. Time and time again, Casemiro and Paulinho broke up El Tri’s forward raids before the Brazilian back four needed to step in. The Mexicans were turned away from the nightclub before they even made it to the bouncer. Two goals against a visibly tiring Mexican defence were enough to make Brazil’s eventual triumph relatively comfortable.

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Osorio made much in the post-match press conference of Neymar’s time-wasting theatrics in the second half, and it is to the Mexicans’ credit that their performance at this World Cup has been blessedly free of cynicism and gamesmanship. On the other hand, Osorio’s indignant reaction points to a softness in the Mexican game, an essential naivety which was a leading cause of their failure, once again, to progress beyond the round of 16. The decision to include 39-year-old Rafael Marquez, appearing in his fifth World Cup, in the starting XI against Brazil seemed emblematic of this muddled approach: at once oddly nostalgic and one match too late. The moment the Mexicans would have benefited most from the presence of a savvy, hard-tackling veteran at the base of their midfield was in the game against Sweden. Instead Osorio started Marquez against Brazil, when Mexico required maximum speed and maximum stamina to sustain their high press and lightning counter-attacks: two qualities Marquez has never had and certainly doesn’t have now, as he ticks over into his fifth decade. The veteran midfielder was predictably anonymous and off the pace; it was no surprise when Osorio took him off at half time.

Osorio’s real failing in this World Cup was to not tinker when he should have (against Sweden) and tinker when he would have been better to leave things alone. In the moments of truth, Mexico – both players and manager – failed to hold their nerve. Osorio, who is regularly linked with the vacancy at the helm of the US men’s national team, has said he will take his time before deciding whether to accept the Mexican federation’s offer of a contract extension. Layun, Guardado, Hernandez and Vela will all be well into their 30s if Mexico get to Qatar, but in Lozano, Carlos Salcedo, Edson Alvarez and Jesus Gallardo, El Tri have a core to build on for the future.

It’s tempting, given everything that unfolded subsequently, to see Mexico’s opening victory over the world champions as less a tale of Mexican success than German defeat; to recast El Tri as the simple beneficiaries of the world champions’ complacency. That would be unfair to Mexico, who played in that match with a lack of inhibition that seemed utterly joyous and in a way almost pure, the transitions from defence to attack unfolding with elastic, instinctive ease: for 90 magical minutes, Mexico were the Platonic ideal of schoolyard football. That match was more than the start of Germany’s death roll; it was a glimpse of the team Mexico wants to be: impish, quicksilver, scheming and direct. For that spectacle alone this side will be remembered fondly. Mexico’s misfortune in this tournament is that they peaked at the first obstacle, and spent the next two weeks trying to recapture that early magic. The only consolation is that, given their status as perennial qualifiers, they will almost certainly have the chance to resume the quest for el quinto partido four years from now. Neutrals will be hoping they arrive in Qatar with grit to accompany their proven polish.