Cuypers's Awakening: When Rayados Needed a Sigh to Be Answered

Some goals do not need a stadium to be heard. That evening, when the ball left Hugo Cuypers's foot and settled into Atlante's net, I sat in front of a screen several thousand kilometres from the stadium and heard clearly the sigh of an entire dressing room echoing through every frame. That 1-1 equaliser was not a masterpiece in the pure technical sense, even though the Mexican newspaper's pen called it a "golazo". But for Cuypers, a man who had just walked through four silent matches, it was like the knock of spring after a long, cold winter in northern Mexico. I have written enough about matches without spectators to know that sometimes a brief moment can compress a story far longer than itself. That shot, the instant Cuypers entered the box, sniffed the chance, and placed the ball into a difficult corner, was not a great footballing event. But it was a human event. And for me, someone who lives in Europe and writes about Mexican football from a geographical distance always compensated by professional closeness, it is the foothold from which to tell this story to those tired of columns of numbers and league tables. Hugo Cuypers, a Belgian boy, arrived in Monterrey with luggage that was not particularly glamorous. He was not a European star coming here to wind down, nor a young talent who had run out of steam in the big leagues. He came as a man searching for himself, in the white-and-blue shirt of one of Liga MX's most storied clubs. Rayados — or CF Monterrey, the name affectionately shortened by its supporters — is one of the empires of Mexican football, but also a place where pressure allows no striker time to grieve. And so, when Cuypers began his Rayados spell with a good rhythm, scoring regularly, we might have thought everything would unfold like a colour film. But football never works that way. Four matches drifted by, stretching from Liga MX to the Leagues Cup, without a single goal. For a striker who is not the team's sole pillar, four matches is a long meadow. For a striker described as "one of the main offensive options", four matches means four times sitting in the dressing room listening to the radio analysing your own invisibility. I have followed many strikers falling into such a dry spell. Each reacts differently. Some run more, as if trying to use their legs to extinguish the rumours. Others stand still, as though not scoring is turning them into statues inside their own penalty area. Cuypers, from what I have observed across matches, belongs to the second group. He is not the type of striker who disrupts opposition defences with constant movement. He is a player of the moment, one who appears exactly when he must and sniffs the chance faster than the crowd. That is why the equaliser against Atlante carries an extra layer of meaning. Watching the clip again, I see Cuypers not trying to create a masterpiece. He simply does what a number 9 does: picks his position, waits for the ball, and when it arrives, places it where Atlante's goalkeeper cannot reach. It is a goal of instinct, not of display. And at a moment when Rayados needed to equalise, that instinct is worth more than any tactical rhetoric. I will not sit here telling you about a result through dry numbers. What I want to keep is the moment Cuypers turns, raises his arms to the sky, and takes a deep breath. That is the breath of a man surfacing after a long submersion. Four goalless matches is not a grand crisis by professional football standards. But it is a personal crisis for a man who came to Mexico to prove he is not a mistaken signing. And when the goal came, it did not come only for Cuypers. It came for Matías Almeyda, who patiently placed his trust in this Belgian player within his tactical system. It came for the coaching staff, for the dressing room, for the Rayados supporters who still stay up late whenever their team takes the field. In football, no goal belongs to one person alone. Even an individual's goal is always the result of an invisible system: the passes, the off-the-ball runs, the shouting at each other on the training pitch. Long ago, I learned never to write about football as if it were a chain of events joined by commas. Football is silences. It is the seconds when a striker stands waiting for the ball and asks himself whether he is still worthy of trust. It is the sound of an opponent's studs running behind your back. It is the silence of the coach on the bench, telling himself that if his student fails to score again today, the pressure will fall on him next week. Matías Almeyda is no stranger to stories like this. He is the kind of manager with a strong personal stamp, a man who builds a system not to serve an individual but to create a collective that knows how to trust itself. In Almeyda's system, a striker is not merely a scorer but the person completing the final piece after the collective has done the hard work. That is why Cuypers continuing to be used throughout the drought was not an accident. It was a philosophical choice. There is a question I always ask myself when looking at any goalless run: is the striker having a problem of instinct, or is the system having a problem of chance creation? In Cuypers's case, the available evidence is very thin. No xG, no shot counts, no analysis of average receiving positions. We only have one raw fact: he did not score for four matches, and then he scored. The rest is the work of imagination and of the craft of observation. In my profession, the most dangerous thing is turning a small event into a large symbol. But precisely for that reason, I am forced to admit that sometimes a small goal can serve as a lighthouse. It not only tells Cuypers that the ball can still enter the net. It also tells the whole team that the road Almeyda is walking can still lead somewhere. In football, belief is built through goals like this. Not through three-hour tactical meetings. I have witnessed the strange contrast between European football and Mexican football. Europe is where every touch is quantified. Mexico is where emotion still has a place in analysis. In Liga MX, people still speak of a team's soul, of a club's tradition, of the weight of the shirt. Rayados, with its white-and-blue colours and deep history, is such a club. That is why Cuypers's goal is not just news. It is part of a larger story about a club trying to return to itself. But it would be dishonest to tell this story as a fairy tale. In modern football, one goal cannot cover every problem. If Cuypers fails to score in the next three matches, the old questions will return. If Rayados do not win in the coming fixtures, the equaliser against Atlante will be remembered as a single moment rather than a turning point. That is the harsh nature of this sport. A goal can ease the pain. But it cannot erase it. I once wrote that the pitch is a character, not a backdrop. In Cuypers's story, the pitch plays a character with a long memory. It remembers the times he stood in the wrong position. It remembers the balls passing in front of his boot that he failed to touch. It also remembers the time he arrived in the right place and did the right thing. In the pitch's memory, a goal is not a number. It is a mark. And Cuypers has just left a mark. There is one detail I always notice when rewatching forwards' goals: the reaction of their teammates. When Cuypers scored, the Rayados players ran to embrace him. On their faces there was no surprise. Only relief. It is the sign of a collective that knows its teammate has been through a difficult period, and that this goal is a reward for everyone's patience. In football, teammates are the ones who know best who is hurting. And they are the ones who know best when that hurt is about to be soothed. Now, let us speak of Atlante. Rayados's opponent in this match is not a top-tier Liga MX side. That is an important detail, and it forces me to question the true value of the goal. Scoring against a weaker side is not proof that a striker has returned to his peak. It is only proof that his instinct remains. In football, keeping your instinct through months of barren days is already an achievement. Many strikers lose it forever. But here, I want to offer another angle, one I consider necessary in any serious analysis. We usually cheer for a striker when he scores again. We call it "breaking the curse", "lifting the hex", "coming back". But few ask: if this goal came in a match where the opponent was weaker, are we not celebrating a victory that has yet to be verified? Are we not giving Cuypers a reassurance he has not truly earned? This is the blind spot of collective memory. We remember the goals scored, but we forget the context in which they were scored. We remember the joy of the moment, but we forget the fragility of the evidence. With Cuypers, the evidence is still far too thin. One goal cannot prove anything about a long-term trend. But one goal is also not without value. It is a seed. And a seed only matters if it is sown in good soil. What is the good soil here? It is Almeyda's system. It is teammates who know how to create chances. It is the atmosphere of a team in need of a spiritual foothold. Cuypers is not in a toxic environment. He is at a club with tradition. But that also means greater pressure. When you wear the Rayados shirt, you do not play only for yourself. You play for a history. I once lived in Madrid, where I learned the craft of writing. I once went to Vallecas, where I saw an old man placing his hand on his grandson's shoulder every time the home side launched the ball forward. I once sat at the Alfredo Di Stéfano stadium during the pandemic months, hearing the studs so clearly I thought I could count every step. Those experiences taught me that football is not a game of numbers. It is a game of people. And every person carries a story that cannot be measured by any metric. Cuypers's story, at this moment, is the story of a man who has just found his breath again. He did not change the world. He did not change the landscape of Liga MX. He merely scored a goal against Atlante. But in the small world of a striker wrestling with himself, that is a large event. And in the frame we all saw, there is a moment that cannot be quantified: the moment Cuypers knew he was still able. Of course, I do not want to be swept up in the emotional whirlwind of a single match. My profession teaches me to keep a certain distance. But my profession also teaches me that distance does not mean indifference. It means being sober enough to see what is real and what is illusion. The truth is that Cuypers scored. The illusion is that Cuypers has returned. The truth is that he ended a four-match goalless run. The illusion is that a streak of brilliance has begun. There is a principle I always follow when writing about football: never draw conclusions from too small a sample. Four scoreless matches is a small sample. One goal is an even smaller one. In the world of small samples, every conclusion is an extrapolation. And extrapolation, however clever it may seem, remains a form of guesswork. I do not write about guesses. I write about what can be seen, felt, remembered. What can be seen here? A Belgian striker, 28 years old, playing for a major Mexican club, who went through a scoreless stretch and has just ended it. An Argentine manager, Matías Almeyda, who trusted his student through difficult matches. A white-and-blue team trying to find its rhythm again. A supporter somewhere, perhaps in Monterrey, perhaps in Hanoi, perhaps in Madrid, who sat watching the match and felt their heart beat one beat faster when the ball hit the net. And what can be felt? Relief. The relief of a man surfacing from water. The relief of a man who knows he has not been forgotten. The relief of a man who understands that in football, as in life, there are stretches when everything seems to conspire against you, and then, suddenly, a small moment appears to confirm that you are still here, still able, still part of the game. Now I want to speak of what I consider most important in this story. Not the goal. Not the four-match goalless run. But patience. In modern football, patience is a commodity more expensive than any million-dollar contract. Clubs change managers after three defeats. Supporters demand selling a striker after five scoreless games. Owners want results immediately. In such an environment, Cuypers being given a chance across four scoreless matches is something worth acknowledging. But patience is not an unconditional gift. It is a conditional investment. Almeyda is patient with Cuypers because he believes this player can contribute to his system. Cuypers is patient with himself because he believes his instinct remains. And when the goal came, that investment began to pay off. But only one coin of interest. The road ahead is still long, and every step will be judged by an unforgiving yardstick: goals. I wonder whether we are placing too much weight on the shoulders of strikers like Cuypers. In football, the scorer is the hero. The non-scorer is the suspect. The line between the two roles is so thin that sometimes it is only a few centimetres. A ball hitting the post. A shot drifting wide. A goalkeeper producing a moment of brilliance. These small things can shape an entire career. And that is the inherent injustice of this sport. In Cuypers's case, that injustice has been temporarily erased by a single moment. But it will return if he does not score in the coming matches. That is the harsh law of football. No goal lasts forever. No relief endures. There is only the journey. And that journey, for Cuypers, has just gained another chapter. A small chapter, but no less important. I once wrote about empty stadiums, about seats without people, about applause fading away. Those experiences taught me that in football, presence is not always measured by numbers. A player can be on the pitch yet absent from the match. A striker can fail to score yet still leave a mark. And conversely, a goal can be scored yet leave nothing but a number on the scoreboard. The difference lies in the story. And Cuypers's story, at this moment, is the story of a man trying to come back. There is a small detail I always remember: when I was a journalism student in Madrid, I once wrote about a match in the Spanish second division. I sat in stand number 12, and I did not pay attention to the score. I paid attention to a 74-year-old man who placed his hand on his grandson's shoulder every time the home team launched the ball. The poem I wrote afterwards was titled "Seat 12 Always Has Two People". From that, I learned that a match can be told in the rhythm of poetry rather than in the scoreline. And when writing about Cuypers's goal, I thought of that principle again. If I write about this goal in the language of statistics, I would say: one goal, one equaliser, four scoreless matches before, one run ended. But if I write in the language of human beings, I would say: a Belgian man, far from home, trying to prove he is still here. In football, both languages are correct. But only one of them makes me want to write. In the end, what I want to keep from this story is not the goal, but the breath. That moment Cuypers took a deep breath after the ball hit the net. It is the breath of a man who has just crossed one mountain pass. Ahead lie many more passes. But at this moment, in this instant, he has done what he needed to do. And in football, sometimes that is enough. I think of the other strikers who have passed through Rayados. Those who scored hundreds of goals, those who became legends, and those who left without leaving much trace. Each carries a story. Cuypers's story has only just begun. The goal against Atlante is not the final chapter. It is only an opening sentence to a chapter none of us can yet predict. But at least now, the page carries a line of writing. And I, from the distant angle of a football writer living in Europe, still sit here, waiting for the next match. Waiting for the moment Cuypers again has the ball in the box. Waiting for the next story to be written. Because football, at its deepest level, is not a game of results. It is a ceaseless flow of breaths. And Cuypers, the Belgian boy with cold feet and the eyes of a man finding his way home, has just let out a long breath. A breath bearing his name.