🇲🇽 Best of 2018: Santos Laguna win the Clausura title | OneFootball

Santos Laguna have consistently been one of the best teams in Mexico as of late. Over the last six years, Santos have won three Liga MX titles in addition to one Copa MX championship.

Los Guerreros seized the 2018 Clausura title after finishing in fourth place during the regular season and had to start their Liguilla journey against a very difficult Tigres side, who defeated Santos 2-0 in the opening leg.

However, Santos would advance with a 2-0 victory in the second leg by virtue of being the higher seed.

Tigres goalkeeper Nahuel Guzmán made a horrific error on Djaniny Tavares’ goal that allowed Santos to take on second-seeded Club América in the semi-finals.

“We were eliminated by a team with heart and we never had it. We never showed superiority,”, said Tigres manager Tuca Ferretti at the post-match press conference.

Santos then set the tone against América quickly in the semi-finals, defeating the Eagles 4-1 in the first leg.

However, Santos were provided a huge scare in the second leg as América cut the aggregate advantage to 4-3 within 23 minutes.

Despite playing in front of over 53,000 fans on the road at the Estadio Azteca, Santos marched out with a 6-3 aggregate victory thanks to goals from Jonathan Rodríguez and Jesús Isijara to set up a title showdown against top-seeded Toluca.

In both legs of the final, Santos striker Julio Furch was the hero, scoring his most important goals for the club.

After initially trailing Toluca 1-0 at home in the first leg, Santos staged a thrilling comeback which was finished off by Furch’s 89th-minute winner to give the hosts a 2-1 advantage heading to the Estadio Corona.

In the 10th minute of the second leg, it was Furch to give the visitors a 3-1 aggregate advantage with a speedy roller into the far corner.

Despite an 82nd-minute goal by Gabriel Hauche to set up an extremely nervy final 10 minutes, Santos held on for a 3-2 aggregate win.

Despite another fourth-placed finish in the Apertura, Santos were unable to replicate their form in the previous season and were bounced out of the quarter-finals by Monterrey 3-0 on aggregate.