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<\/p>\nNearly three years ago, when Matt Valentine was conjuring up his lofty ambitions for the professional soccer club he dreamed of building in Dallas, he jotted down a list of players as potential dream signings.<\/p>\n
At the top of that list? The Mexico national team\u2019s record goalscorer, Javier \u2018Chicharito\u2019 Hern\u00e1ndez, who at the time was nearing the end of his four seasons with Major League Soccer\u2019s LA Galaxy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI forgot that I even put that on there,\u201d Valentine, the now founder and chairman of Atl\u00e9tico Dallas, said with a smile in an exclusive interview with The Athletic on Monday morning. \u201cI never in my wildest dreams thought we could have a player of his caliber right off the bat.\u201d<\/p>\n
After a months-long courtship, that included keeping Valentine\u2019s dream signing under wraps through this summer\u2019s men\u2019s World Cup, the USL Championship expansion side has announced Hern\u00e1ndez as its first player before a debut season in 2027.<\/p>\n
The 38-year-old Mexican international has signed a two-year contract, with a club option for a third, pending league and federation approval, Atl\u00e9tico Dallas announced on Monday. The signing includes plans for Hern\u00e1ndez to eventually move into the club\u2019s sporting department, with ambitions of growing the sport in the U.S. city.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a new chapter in my career, in my life,\u201d Hern\u00e1ndez told The Athletic. \u201cIt\u2019s a project that I\u2019m very attracted to because it\u2019s a long-term project. It\u2019s (just) starting, but it\u2019s not that I\u2019m going to be here just for one year and then \u2018Goodbye.\u2019 I\u2019m going to have a relationship with this club for (the long term), and I hope we can achieve our goals.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course, we want to win championships. We want to win games. We want to be a great football club, as well \u2013 but what we want the most is to connect with the Dallas people, and they can feel represented. And Atl\u00e9tico Dallas can become something very important for the city.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n Hernandez scored 39 goals in 82 matches for LA Galaxy over four seasons from 2020 (Cliff Hawkins\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Hern\u00e1ndez was last with his boyhood club, Chivas Guadalajara of Mexico, where he signed a two-year contract in January 2024. Chivas is where he started his globetrotting journey as a professional footballer in 2006 at 18 years old, but his late-career homecoming was marred by injury and criticism.<\/p>\n
After his time at Chivas ended in December, Valentine saw an opening when he learned Hern\u00e1ndez was in Dallas. His chief strategy officer called and asked if he would be interested in trying to set up a meeting \u2014 Valentine jumped at the offer. \u201cI was blown away, first of all, that it was even an option,\u201d he recounted. \u201cWe\u2019d be crazy not to (try).\u201d<\/p>\n
It took between four and six weeks to arrange a sit-down, and then the courtship began.<\/p>\n
Valentine and co were keen on selling him their vision, and Hern\u00e1ndez, they realized, was thinking beyond what he could offer the club on the pitch.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause of my career and because of what happened in Guadalajara in these two years, I didn\u2019t want to go and just play for (the sake of) playing,\u201d Hern\u00e1ndez said. \u201cI\u2019m gonna be the face of this organization, so far. I\u2019m gonna help the league to get more connection, as well, with a lot of cities that they might not have MLS teams, or they have USL teams. I\u2019m gonna bring a lot of my expertise\u201d to the club.<\/p>\n
Hern\u00e1ndez is considered one of the greatest Mexican players to have ever played, scoring 59 goals across 109 appearances with the national team. Known as Chicharito (Little Pea), he represented his country in three World Cups, a Copa Am\u00e9rica, a Concacaf Gold Cup and two editions of the now-defunct Confederations Cup. His club career spanned the world, from Chivas to Manchester United, Real Madrid, Bayer Leverkusen, West Ham United, Sevilla and LA Galaxy.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s such an amazing finisher, and that\u2019s a skill that you can take with you. We think at our level, he\u2019ll still be incredibly competitive,\u201d Brian Corcoran, Atl\u00e9tico\u2019s sporting director, told The Athletic. \u201cWe\u2019re a football club, and part of that is putting our best foot forward for our supporters and competing on the field \u2014 and something since day one that we feel Javi can help us do is compete.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of other things he offers us in a changing room, like mentoring young players, which we want to attract top young players in this country. I can\u2019t wait to see us on the grass (playing matches). Between now and then it\u2019s going to be a madhouse, but that\u2019s when the real moment starts for me.\u201d<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
\n Hern\u00e1ndez was a regular scorer in Europe for clubs including Manchester United and (above) Real Madrid (Gonzalo Arroyo Moreno\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Atl\u00e9tico Dallas begins its inaugural season in the USL Championship, the second tier of club soccer in the United States, one rung below MLS, in 2027, playing home games at the Texas city\u2019s famous 92,000-capacity Cotton Bowl stadium.<\/p>\n
In February, the club unveiled former France international Peter Luccin as first-team manager. With Hern\u00e1ndez, the team now has its first player, but there is plenty that still needs to get done. The club is close to signing three additional players, Corcoran said, and is eager for the expected surge in interest that it envisions will come from a big-name arrival like Chicharito.<\/p>\n
For Hern\u00e1ndez, the biggest draw is the opportunity to build something new in Dallas, already home to MLS side FC Dallas, where he hopes to plant his roots for years to come. He envisions a club that can help grow the game of soccer in the United States, and even tap into younger generations\u2019 potential in Mexico, where he sees gaps that offer opportunities. He is looking forward to seeing what he can build in Dallas, a city that he says has \u201cembraced me\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s gonna be a place where I\u2019m gonna have something that is gonna make me come back, regardless of when I\u2019m gonna retire,\u201d Hern\u00e1ndez said. \u201cIt\u2019s very, very important for me that I\u2019m gonna be playing my last years over here with them, and in the way that it\u2019s gonna happen, in the way that I envision and they envision.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope the people in the USL as well can see the last part of Chicharito, Javier Hernandez, y\u2019know, with Atl\u00e9tico Dallas. The franchise wants to become one of the best in the USL, and then, you never know in the future what could happen \u2014 because I think Dallas, like in Los Angeles, deserves to have two teams in the MLS, sooner or later. Why not Atl\u00e9tico Dallas?\u201d<\/p>\n
But the one thing he looks forward to most?<\/p>\n
\u201cPlay(ing) football again,\u201d he says. \u201cWhat I love to do the most since I came to this world is playing football.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf everything goes in the way that we envision, I think the league is going to grow. This team is going to grow, and I\u2019m gonna have so much fun, and hopefully I can give good performances \u2014 a lot of goals, win games, have a very good chapter with this team and this organization.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nearly three years ago, when Matt Valentine was conjuring up his lofty ambitions for the professional soccer club…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":388600,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[136948,102,104,103,55543,93585,43976,136946,136,43977,136949,731,73649,136947],"class_list":["post-388599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-bayer-leverkusen","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news","tag-liga-mx","tag-los-angeles-galaxy","tag-manchester-united","tag-mexico-mens-national-team","tag-mls","tag-real-madrid","tag-sevilla","tag-soccer","tag-usl","tag-west-ham-united"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388599"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388599\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/388600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}