New club, new ambitions. And a new face from the very beginning. In Dallas, a city that already has an MLS presence, a new side has emerged under the name Atlético. The reference to Madrid’s Colchoneros is deliberate. To show they are serious, the club’s owners—whose team will compete in the USL Championship, the second tier of American professional football, while operating independently from MLS—have chosen the irresistible pull of Chicharito Hernández. A name that may still evoke, especially in Europe, the promise of those seasons at Manchester United and Bayer Leverkusen more than a decade ago. Yet while the most prolific goalscorer in Mexican football history never quite completed the final step towards global superstardom, across the Americas he remains a genuine icon. One of the most recognisable footballers of his generation.
At 38, Hernández’s value is no longer measured only in goals. It is everything around them that makes him valuable now. He remains a link between millions of supporters on both sides of the Tex-Mex border, has spent the final years of his career moving between the two football worlds—first with LA Galaxy, then with Chivas Guadalajara—and has become a force on social media along the way. Especially on TikTok, where his unexpected cooking videos have turned into a small phenomenon. For a club that has appeared almost overnight, still looking for an identity and for a figure around whom a community can begin to form, Chicharito is the perfect starting point. The idea is visible from the badge itself: a Mexican grey wolf and a rattlesnake, symbols designed to speak to a public that exists across two countries. Few players embody that shared space better than Hernández, beyond the political debates that surround the border. He will not only be Atlético Dallas’ public face. For now, he is also the club’s first and only signing.
More a statement of intent than a sporting solution. Hernández has not featured for Mexico in seven years and his role at club level is far removed from what it once was. But the value of this move was never going to be found only in his minutes on the pitch. This is the summer of year zero, and Dallas is still being built. There are, however, some notable foundations already in place. The model is Atlético Madrid, where the new club’s first coach, Peter Luccin, spent three seasons between 2004 and 2007. The Spanish side has also strengthened its presence in Texas in recent years through technical partnerships with local academies. By now, the Atlético name has travelled almost everywhere. Guayaquil, San Luis, Ottawa, Kolkata. Football clubs have appeared and disappeared across the world carrying the same badge. Dallas is not officially part of that story yet, but it is already looking towards the Wanda Metropolitano, waiting for Chicharito to set the direction. Then comes the rest: building the team around him.