When the team bus pulls up at Reliant Stadium this evening and Coach Hugo Sanchez and the players on the Mexican national soccer team disembark, another milestone will have been reached.

For the fifth consecutive year, the Tricolor will be on tour in a country where it is every bit as welcome and as well-supported as it is in Mexico City, Guadalajara, Monterrey or anywhere else “El Tri” travels.

More than 60,000 fans are expected for tonight’s friendly against the United States national team, and the crowd could very easily approach the 70,092 that packed this same stadium last year to see Mexico play Costa Rica in the Gold Cup.

The most popular soccer team in the U.S.? It’s Mexico by a landslide.

Large crowds have been the norm across the country for the last four years.

In 2007, Mexico played 12 games in nine U.S. cities and averaged 53,207 people per game.

Putting that into perspective, the U.S. national team played 12 games at home and drew an average of 32,754 people.

Take away the two games against Mexico, and the U.S. averaged 27,958.

But far from being a dampener on the growth of American soccer in general and Major League Soccer in particular, Mexico’s national and club teams could well be the catalyst that makes soccer thrive in the U.S.

“There’s a quote from French philosopher Auguste Comte that ‘demography is destiny,’ and it’s pretty apropos to what’s happening in this country,” said Will Wilson, executive vice president of Soccer United Marketing, or SUM.

“It’s very hard to deny the demographic shift that’s happened in the U.S. over the last 10 or 15 years. The high percentage of Mexicans that are part of that shift means the demand for soccer has grown exponentially, along with the growth of soccer in the mainstream in the U.S.