Pumas stages comeback bid against Cruz Azul in Liga MX semifinal second leg

On a December evening in Mexico City, Cruz Azul completed a formality that had been decided a week earlier, advancing to the Liga MX final with a 7-0 aggregate over Pumas. Football sometimes asks teams to play matches whose outcomes are already written in the ledger of prior results, and this semifinal was such a match — a test not of possibility but of dignity. Pumas fought with urgency and scored twice, but the first leg's 4-0 verdict had already closed the door; what remained was only the question of how each side would carry themselves through it.