PACHUCA, Mexico (AP) — Mexico hopes to showcase its soccer culture both on and off the pitch when it co-hosts the World Cup with the United States and Canada next month.
While the sport is growing across North America, it has long been the undisputed No. 1 in Mexico, which will become the first country to host three men’s World Cups.
The roots of modern Mexican soccer can be traced far beyond the host cities of Guadalajara, Monterrey and Mexico City to a misty silver mining town where Britons and Mexicans forged a bond in the 19th century.
British miners—chiefly from Cornwall — brought the sport to Mineral del Monte, formerly known as Real del Monte, a mountain town located near Pachuca, around 100 kilometers (60 miles) northeast of Mexico City, where they worked in the local silver mines.
“When the miners arrived, they started playing among themselves during their breaks, and then they involved the Mexicans, who found it strange at first, but they started playing and interacting, and that’s how they began to spread the football fever in Real del Monte,” said Brasil Ordaz, who teaches soccer history at the Soccer Hall of Fame museum in Pachuca.
Matches between English and Mexican teams were played near the Dolores Mine in the late 1800s and early 1900s, on a site now used as a parking lot. A dusty metal plaque marks the location as the birthplace of soccer in Mexico.
Nearby, some businesses display the flags of Britain and Mexico. There is a small museum that proclaims “Football in Mexico was born in a place close to heaven” — a reference to Mineral del Monte’s elevation of 2,700 meters (8,860 feet) above sea level.
Other memorabilia from the early years, including an old mining helmet, is on display inside the Soccer Hall of Fame, a site established in 2011 in Pachuca, 18 kilometers (11 miles) from Mineral del Monte.
The birth of organized soccer in Mexico
Though rugby is a more popular sport in Cornwall, the miners in Mexico “decided early on to play soccer rather than rugby, hence its spread,” said Sharron Schwartz, a historian from Redruth in Cornwall, specializing in Cornish migration.
“The game appealed to the Mexicans, as it was deemed to be modern, encapsulated British cultural imperialism, and people wanted to emulate the British sense of fair play,” Schwartz said. “Football also helped to break down ethnic, racial and class barriers and promoted integration and social cohesion.”
In 1892, British technicians, engineers, and miners founded the Pachuca Football Club, earning Pachuca the enduring title of “Cuna del fútbol” (The Cradle of Soccer), although some other Mexican cities dispute that claim.
“Pachuca, where the majority of the Cornish community resided, set up an organized team comprised of men who had been part of the cricket club and some recent arrivals from Cornwall,” Schwartz said. “In 1895, the Pachuca Cricket Club, the Pachuca Football Club and the Velasco Cricket Club, amalgamated to form the Pachuca Athletic Club.”
Gradually the game spread across the country.
Pachuca Athletic Club disappeared in 1922, but was reborn in 1950, now made up exclusively of Mexicans, to join the second professional division in Mexico.
A lasting Cornish legacy
Pachuca was promoted four times and relegated three times, failing to establish themselves in the top flight until 1998. A year later, they won their first league title under the leadership of Javier Aguirre, currently the coach of Mexico’s national team.
The club has won six more Mexican league titles since then — and is the only Mexican team to have won the Copa Sudamericana, South America’s second -biggest club competition. Pachuca was runner-up in the 2024 Intercontinental Cup, losing to Real Madrid in the final.
“Pachuca has been a team where we’ve experienced everything, from being on top to being at the bottom, we went up and down, but since 1998 a golden era began and they are a benchmark team in Mexican football,” Ordaz said.
Besides soccer, the Cornish miners left another legacy in the region: the Cornish pasty, a folded pastry filled with meat, potatoes, swede and onion. Locals tweaked the recipe to add ingredients including beans, jalapeño peppers, chicken, mole or sweet fillings like pineapple jam or cajeta, a Mexican spread similar to dulce de leche.
Schwartz said Redruth is twinned with Mineral del Monte, and both towns host pasty festivals in the fall.
“Along with the transfer of steam engine technology and the pasty, the Cornish take pride in the role that they played in the popularization of the beautiful game,” she said.
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