Márquez, who plays for Barcelona, is expected to miss Wednesday’s match with a calf

injury. Dos Santos is expected to start at forward or as an attacking midfielder. Club teams

in Italy, Spain and Turkey have reportedly shown interest (though he has said he plans to

return to Tottenham). Again, all of Mexico has raised its hopes and anticipation for him.

On Monday, dos Santos laughed easily with teammates as he jogged before training, but the

Mexican soccer federation is shielding him from reporters. He is young, and there is much

pressure on him and the national team.

“I wasn’t as bad as everybody thought and I’m not as good as everybody thought,” dos

Santos recently told ESPN Deportes, a Spanish-language network. “I’m going through a great

moment, and I hope to capitalize on it.”

A defeat Wednesday could wreck Mexico’s chances of qualifying for the 2010 World Cup in

South Africa. Only three teams from the Confederation of North, Central American and

Caribbean region will qualify automatically. The fourth-place team will enter a home-and-

away playoff against the fifth-place team from South America. Mexico now holds that perilous

fourth spot.

“A loss would crush them,” Landon Donovan, the American playmaker, said.

Losing for the first time at home to the United States would also deal a blow to the

national psyche of a country already struggling with a global recession, a swine flu

epidemic and murderous drug wars.

Last December, dos Santos, then 19, was photographed at Tottenham’s Christmas party,

appearing to be extremely drunk, seemingly in way over his head, unable to stand on his own

two feet.

In March of this year, he was lent to Ipswich Town, a step below the Premier League, a

career depreciation that The Guardian newspaper of Manchester called a “humiliating descent

” for a player once considered a rising international star.

Dos Santos has since turned 20, though, and perhaps he has shed his callowness with his

teenage years. Last month, he was named the most valuable player of the regional Gold Cup

tournament. In a 5-0 rout of the United States in the final at Giants Stadium, he and his

fellow forward Carlos Vela, also 20, scored or facilitated Mexico’s first four goals.

For the first time in a decade, Mexico defeated the Americans in the United States. And for

one of the rare times since his success at the junior level, dos Santos displayed enormous

possibility. The defeat brought little recrimination for the United States, which fielded a

team of reserves. For Mexico and dos Santos, though, victory might have brought an

awakening.

His curly hair secured beneath a wide headband, playing with muscle and finesse, dos Santos

ran unencumbered into vacant spaces as the American defense stretched and then shredded. He

threatened from his preferred spot on the right wing, knifing inside, dribbling securely

with his favored left foot, passing ingeniously, drawing a penalty kick for Mexico, scoring

a predatory rebound goal.

“Giovani grew in the Gold Cup,” the Mexican defender Rafael Márquez said. “He achieved a

level of responsibility that he didn’t before. He proved the quality of player he is, the

Giovani we need for the national team. This kind of player, Mexico doesn’t have that much.

”

MEXICO CITY — When he faces the United States Wednesday in a crucial World Cup

qualifying match, the young forward Giovani dos Santos will again be considered the future

of Mexican soccer. Perhaps this time, the pedestal will not be as rickety as it is

elevating.
As Mexico won the FIFA U-17 World Cup in 2005, dos Santos was voted the tournament’s

second-best player. He was the son of a Brazilian father and possessed that familiar

Brazilian flair with the ball. The next Ronaldinho, they called him.

Of course, it was too much, too soon. Depending on who tells the story, the teenager’s

chest puffed too broadly with self-satisfaction or his slim shoulders could not bear the

weight of expectation. He quickly tumbled from that pedestal of national faith.

The decline of dos Santos’s career could be found on his inverted club résumé. He grew up

in the Barcelona youth system, then played for the senior club in 2007-8, before moving to

Tottenham Hotspur in the English Premier League for 2008-9, where he struggled with fitness

on the field and hit bottom off it.

On Monday night, Robinson Cano and Jerry Hairston Jr. also hit back-to-back home runs in

the Yankees’ 5-4 loss. Tuesday marked the first time since 1983 that the Yankees hit back-

to-back home runs in three consecutive games.
“I initially thought that somebody reached over,” Gaston said. “But the umpires were nice

enough to check the play out, and it was a home run.”
It was the second time this season that Posada put the Yankees ahead on a home run that had

to be reviewed. On April 19, Posada hit a go-ahead home run to the short porch in right

against the Cleveland Indians. That blast was upheld after replay review. He went in the

clubhouse to watch the replay as Tuesday’s home run was under review.
“You’re waiting for good news,” Posada said. “You look at the video, but still, it’s

whatever they think, whatever they see.”
The Yankees added two insurance runs in the inning, as they did Sunday. Those runs turned

out to be more important when Mariano Rivera allowed his first run since June 12 on a homer

to Edwin Encarnacion, ending his streak of 22 1/3 scoreless innings before nailing down the

save.
With the comeback, the Yankees spared Joba Chamberlain from taking the loss in his second

consecutive disappointing start.