Mohamed's Twelfth Night

In college, I played the role of Viola in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and got to say these lines:

I hate ingratitude more in a man

than lying, vainness, babbling, drunkenness,

or any taint of vice whose strong corruption

inhabits our frail blood.

I thought of those lines again while watching Club America win their historic twelfth championship. How could Club America be so ungrateful?

Truth is, the club has treated the coach, Antonio Mohamed, who got them there very shabbily. It's quite stunning that the team would negotiate for a new coach even as Mohamed was leading the team through the playoffs in search of the title. Not surprisingly, that became the story of the championship. 

It may come back to haunt the club in more ways than just playing against Mohamed in the future. Besides Gustavo Matosas, what coach in their right mind would want to sign with a club that would do this?

What Price a Coach?

I dismissed the first reports of Gustavo Matosas signing as the new coach of Club America because it didn't make sense that any team would undercut a coach in the middle of a playoff run, with just the championship match yet to go. 

But more and more, the same news kept showing up, until, though still unverified by the team officially, there was too much smoke for me to pretend there was no fire under the butt of Antonio Mohamed. 

I couldn't help shaking my head about it even as I started to believe it. Why undercut a coach who still had work to do? Why couldn't any replacement work wait? How could the Club America administration risk a championship just to get rid of a coach a few days earlier? 

The basic question is - is getting Matosas worth risking the historic 12th championship for Club America? That's what's in danger now.