Santiago Sandoval was at the center of a missed scoring chance for Chivas early in its Jornada 5 meeting with Tijuana, when he could not control a filtered pass cleanly enough inside the penalty area. The move ended with a chance wasted, even though Chivas was already finding ways to unsettle an unbeaten opponent.
The moment matters because it came in a match that had a real edge to it from the start. Tijuana arrived in Guadalajara, Jalisco, without a loss in Liga MX, carrying three victories and one draw, while Chivas came in on three straight matches without losing after an opening defeat. That made every attacking opening feel heavier, especially for a team trying to turn possession into something more than pressure.
Chivas had already shown that it could do that. Ricardo Marín put it ahead 1-0 at 23 minutes with a header after a play assisted by Diego Campillo, and the build-up again exposed how quickly the home side could punish Tijuana when it moved the ball with purpose. The Sandoval chance fit the same pattern: Chivas was controlling stretches of the game and still carving out clean looks in the box.
That is what gives the miss its weight. Against a side that had come in third in the overall standings and unbeaten, Chivas did not need a perfect night to create danger; it needed sharper final touches. Sandoval’s failure to bring down the pass kept a promising move from becoming another goal, and the fact that the opportunity came while Chivas was already on the front foot says more about its attacking volume than the one error alone.
There was also no sign that Tijuana had come merely to absorb pressure. The visitors had enough form to make the match meaningful on its own, and Chivas had enough early momentum to keep forcing the issue. The balance left Sandoval’s miss as one of those plays that can define how a match feels long before the final whistle, even when the scoreboard is still moving.
What follows is simple: Chivas has already shown it can find the first goal and keep pressing, but the cleaner question now is whether Sandoval can turn a half-chance into the next one when the game opens up again. For a team that had already taken control, that finishing touch may decide how comfortable the night becomes.
