Jamaica vs Mexico: El Tri Still Have a Lot of Work to Do Before 2014 World Cup

Jose Manuel de la Torre is safe, for now.

With a 1-0 win against Jamaica on Tuesday night, Mexico went to the top of the 2014 World Cup qualifying group. It's quite a change from where they were to start the day. El Tri was in fifth place and out of the World Cup.

Despite the turn of fortunes, there are plenty of reasons for Mexico supporters to feel a bit nervous after the performance against the Reggae Boyz.

Plain and simply, El Tri looked very bad at times. The entire first half was a struggle as they failed to create anything in attack. Even in the second half, things only marginally improved.

Andres Guardado and Carlos Salcido had a very good game running down the left flank, but they were largely helped out by how poor Jamaica right-back Alvas Powell was. Aside from Guardado, Salcido and Aldo de Nigris, there was very little to like when considering who did well in the attack.

Javier Hernandez was very poor. He didn't get the best supply, but when he did get the ball, Chicharito was wasteful. He had a couple of good chances to score and did nothing with them. You would have been forgiven if you didn't even realize at times that Hernandez was still in the match.

While Chicharito's performance could be an outlier, Mexico's attack as a whole continues to be a larger problem. They have only scored six goals in their seven matches in 2013. You've got the home draws to Jamaica and the United States in World Cup qualification that really stand out for how little El Tri created.

They continue to have issues linking the defense to the attack, and then finding that killer ball leading to a goal. It's become a consistent enough issue that you simply can't write it off as the result of a couple of bad matches. It's a bad trend that will continue to haunt Mexico until De La Torre figures out a solution.

He can't continue to rely on the same players and same tactics and expect something to change. He needs to be more proactive with this team and try to get ahead of the problem before it grows into a monster.

Of course, the issues need to be put into perspective.

There's virtually no way Mexico fail to qualify for the 2014 World Cup. Even before the Jamaica win, people questioning El Tri's chances for Brazil were getting way ahead of themselves. There's simply too much talent on the team to envision it losing out to somebody like Costa Rica, Panama or Honduras for a spot in the World Cup.

Simply getting to the event isn't enough, though. Fans will rightfully expect more of Mexico when they reach the World Cup. They shouldn't be content with going and dropping out in the group stage.

Unless things change, that could become a very real possibility. Fortunately for Mexico and De La Torre, there's still plenty of time in the qualification process to right the ship.