CD Tenerife (Spain)

Club Deporto Tenerife are based in the island’s capital of Santa Cruz, having been formed in 1922. Although La Liga began in 1928, “Tete” remained in regional football until 1953 when they joined Segunda Division.

They spent a solitary season from 1961 in the top flight, but from 1962 to 1976 they spent their time in the second and third tiers. In 1989 they returned to La Liga. In both 1992 and 1993 they miraculously beat Real Madrid on the last day of each season to secure their safety and deny Real the title, which went to their deadly rivals Barca.

The club had head coaches of the calibre of Jorge Valdano, Jupp Heynckes and Rafael Benitez at the helm and they even had a couple of seasons in the UEFA Cup. Unfortunately “Chicharreros” (a nickname given to the club after the type of mackerel eaten by the inhabitants of Santa Cruz when it was a small fishing village) hit a downward spiral. They ran up a Euro40M debt as the presidency changed hands on a couple of occasions.

The current president as of 2010, Miguel Concepción, has been negotiating with politicians and businessmen, and created a construction company as a subsidiary of the side to help to recover the debts. However, the team were relegated at the end of the 2010-11 season.

CD Tenerife will play in Segunda Division B in the 2012-13 season.

My visit

I was in Tenerife on holiday for a week sorted out through my mate Steve Walker and his pals Julie and Heath and some employees at the Pizza Hut in Scarborough in November 1994. We had hired an open top jeep to get us around sightseeing during our stay which seven of us somehow squeezed into.

We decide to go for a full day out on Sunday 27^th November and began by driving up to the capital Santa Cruz. I saw the Estadio Heliodoro Rodríguez López as we drove by a side street. We stopped for a while in the centre, but found we had hit siesta time, with most places closed. This was a bit of a blow as the city seemed very nice. However, we went on a drive to Puerto de la Cruz and then back home over the hills.

When Julie, Heath and Steve suggested going back to the capital on the Thursday I was well up for it. I saw my chance to grab a look inside the stadium. We found it but it was all locked up. A gent was coming out of the offices, no doubt for his siesta. I enquired if I could have a look inside. He wasn’t massively helpful. Eventually he gave in a little and said I could go inside at 4pm. It was only lunchtime so it didn’t look good for me.

My travel mates felt sorry for me and agreed to hang around. They did some shopping while I went into an extremely cheap local bar and refreshed myself, before we set out once again to Estadio Heliodoro Rodríguez López. I think the bloke was shocked to see us come back, although to be fair he grudgingly allowed us inside the Main Stand.

This was a towering two tiered structure. There were seated stands going behind both goals on two tiers, before it gave way to a single tiered area opposite. The ground was totally fitted out with seats and looked excellent. I had loaded the film into my camera incorrectly some days earlier. Oh for digital cameras back then! I have used the web to source the images in this post.The stadium has been completed as the seating tiers now go all around.

Owing to my incompetence at loading my old camera, the photos for this section are taken from the internet.