TORREON, Mexico -- In the case of El Tri, what a difference four years make.

At this point in the qualification process for South Africa 2010 -- with one game left in the semifinal round -- Mexico's chances of making the final qualifying round in CONCACAF were still up in the air.

After a strong start, the team under then head coach Sven Goran Eriksson, had fallen on hard times, reaping only one point from its last three semifinal encounters.  That form nearly cost El Tri any chance for a ticket to South Africa, as Mexico dropped into a tie in second place of Group 2 with Jamaica, on ten points.

The Mexicans went through to the Hexagonal on goal differential, but their third round record of three wins, a draw and two losses is a reminder of just how challenging the semifinal phase of CONCACAF qualifying can be.

This time around, things couldn't be any more different.  Mexico is aiming to go a perfect 6-0-0 in the third round of 2014 World Cup Qualifying, having secured its ticket to next year's Hexagonal after just four matches.  While El Tri now has the luxury of a pair of low-pressure games to close the round, culminating with Tuesday night's match in Torreon, El Salvador and Costa Rica are busy fighting down to the wire for the second spot from this year's Group B.

That's a change that Mexican players and fans alike can celebrate.  It has been a remarkable four-year period in Mexican football, summed up nicely by the ease with which this group has cruised through the third round of qualifying.

Besides the struggles in World Cup qualifying, 2008 proved a low ebb for Mexican football in general.  The U-23 team failed to qualify for the Olympic Games in Beijing, crashing out in the group stage of CONCACAF qualifying.A year later, Mexico's U-20 team would fail to make the World Cup at that level.

With the national team on the brink of the unthinkable -- missing out on qualifying for the World Cup for the first time since 1982 (Mexico's World Cup 1990 absence was due to suspension) -- the Mexican Football Federation took a long, hard look at how things might be changed for the better going forward.

The first step was to bring back Javier Aguirre, a coach intimately familiar with the Mexican game, who proceeded to guide his country through qualifying and to the 2010 World Cup.

In the meantime, Mexico placed a heavy focus on development, with the Federation and league clubs working together to boost youth football.

That investment, along with the continued evolution of Mexico's first "golden generation" of young players -- the group that lifted the 2005 U-17 World Cup in Peru -- has led El Tri to the dawn of this golden age.

Jose Manuel de la Torre, the current national team head coach, picked up right where Aguirre left off at the end of the 2010 World Cup cycle, with a 2011 Gold Cup crown.On the heels of further triumph at the 2012 Olympic Games, a host of young players are edging their way into El Tri as the senior team gets younger by the match.

After impressive overall records in 2011 and 2012, de la Torre has Mexico truly believing that it can add significant senior level success to the growing litany of youth titles.  With the 2013 Gold Cup and the FIFA Confederations Cup on the schedule for next year, this team won't need to wait long for its chance to win another title.

In the meantime, Mexico puts its perfect qualifying record on the line once again Tuesday against El Salvador.  Regardless of the final result, things look positive for both the immediate and-long term futures of El Tri.  If times have seldom been better for Mexican football, much can be traced back to that point exactly four years ago, when things started to change for the better.