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Cruzazulear: How La Maquina's near-misses became a Mexican slang word

Every country and every league has their lovable losers. The teams that are almost there, that nearly miss, that have a huge following now accustomed to getting hopes up only for things to end in disappointment.

Only Mexico has "Cruzazulear." To Cruz Azul.

Sometimes it gets used to mean "messing up," but that's not quite the true essence of the word. The real definition requires things to have been going well and then go horribly wrong.

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Oh sure, the stodgy Real Academia Espanola might not recognize it as a real word, saying in 2016 that it is "not studying the inclusion of this word.