Game Summary
Santamaria was a starter and played the full 90 minutes, while Ormeño stayed on the bench.
The León came from behind to defeat Atlas 3-2 on Thursday night in the first leg of the Apertura-2021 Mexican football tournament final played at Nou Camp stadium.
In a duel of Argentine coaches, the team led by Ariel Holand had to equalize the score twice against the squad coached by Diego Cocca and ended up winning with a late penalty goal.
The contest started on a good note for Atlas. In the 11th minute, they had a throw-in from the right, Diego Barbosa sent the ball into the box, Argentine Julio Furch let it pass, and left-back Luis Reyes, who had joined the attack, scored 0-1 with a low half-turn shot.
The situation became complicated for 'La Fiera' (The Beast) after half an hour of play due to a muscle injury suffered by Colombian defender Andres Mosquera, who had to be substituted.
'La Fiera' (The Beast) launched an attack for the equalizer. In the 37th minute, Ecuadorian Angel Mena passed the ball to Chilean Jean Meneses, who extended the pass with his head to his compatriot Victor Davila, who scored 1-1 with a powerful left-footed volley from outside the area.
The ball slipped into the upper left corner of the goal, with the helpless flight of Colombian goalkeeper Camilo Vargas.
In the final stretch of the first half, both teams looked for another goal. Jairo Torres tested the León goalkeeper, who saved the shot, and then Mena responded with a very wide shot that passed in front of the Atlas goal.
In the second half, in the 52nd minute, Meneses sent a dangerous shot from outside the area that hit the crossbar of the Atlas goal.
Atlas took the lead again in the 65th minute when Furch connected a powerful left-footed shot inside the León area for 2-1.
It seemed like the 'Zorros' (Foxes) were heading for victory, but León found the 2-2 after a mistake by Vargas. The Colombian goalkeeper rejected a shot from Meneses, and Mena took advantage of the rebound to score the equalizer in the 77th minute.
'La Fiera' (The Beast) sealed the 3-2 with a penalty awarded for a foul on Dávila and executed by Mena with a left-footed shot to the right that beat Vargas' dive in the 86th minute.
The second leg of this final will be played on Sunday at Jalisco stadium.
The champion will be the team that scores the most goals on the global scoreboard; in case of a tied aggregate score, the criteria of a better position on the table will no longer apply and extra time would be played. If the tie persists, penalty shootouts would be executed.
In this final, Atlas is seeking its second league title after winning the first one 70 years ago in the 1950-51 season. On the other hand, León is going for its ninth championship.