Deportivo Táchira F.C.

In 1970, Italian-born Gaetano Greco founded an amateur club called Juventus in San Cristóbal, named after the Juventus FC. In 1974, Greco noticed that there were no professional football clubs in Táchira, so he decided to found a club in Táchira based on the amateur Juventus club. He and twelve other people founded the club on January 11 of that year, which they named San Cristóbal Fútbol Club. Most of the club's players came from the Juventus club. Initially, the club's colors were blue and white, similar to the Italy national football team kits.

In January 1975, the club changed its colors to yellow and black, because those colors better represented the Táchira state and were the preferred colors of the Uruguayan manager José "Pocho" Gil, as they were the colors of the Uruguayan team Peñarol.

In the 2016 season, Deportivo Táchira drew an average home league attendance of 5,595 in the Apertura and 4,033 in the Clausura, the highest in the domestic league.^[1]

The club's home stadium is Polideportivo de Pueblo Nuevo, located in San Cristóbal. It has a maximum capacity of 42,500 people.

The team's supporters are known as aurinegros ("gold-and-blacks"). The supporters are mainly divided into three groups; La Torcida Aurinegra , La Avalancha Sur, and Comando Sur.

Several of the team's supporters have committed violent acts in the past towards the supporters of opposing teams. One of the most tragic events took place on December 17, 2000, when the club and Caracas drew 2–2, which gave the Copa República Bolivariana de Venezuela's title to Caracas, causing angry supporters of Deportivo Táchira to burn the Caracas team bus.^[2]

Games between Deportivo Táchira and Estudiantes de Mérida are known as the Clásico de Los Andes (meaning Andes' Derby). However, in recent years games between Deportivo Táchira and Caracas have been known as the modern derby, because of the successful performance of both teams. A former rival of Deportivo Táchira in the 1980s and early 1990s was Marítimo de Venezuela, a former team from Caracas.

Deportivo Táchira's shirt has black and yellow vertical stripes, with black shorts and socks.

• Primera División Venezolana: 10

1979, 1981, 1984, 1986, 1999-2000, 2007–08, 2010–11, 2014–15, 2021, 2023

• Copa Venezuela: 1

1982

• Copa Libertadores: 25 appearances

• Copa Sudamericana: 5 appearances

2002: Preliminary Round

2012: Preliminary Round

2021: Round of 16

2022: Quarter-finals

2023: First round

• Copa CONMEBOL: 3 appearances

1993: First Round

1996: First Round

1997: First Round

• Deportivo Táchira is the Venezuelan club with the most Copa Libertadores appearances and the most runner-up finishes in the Venezuelan league. It has won nine national championships.
• The club's best Copa Libertadores participation was in 2004, when the club became the second team to qualify for the quarter-finals of the competition without losing a match, having played against strong teams such as River Plate (Argentina), Libertad (Paraguay), Deportes Tolima (Colombia), and Nacional (Uruguay), before facing São Paulo (Brazil) in the quarter-finals.

As of 16 October 2023

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player 1 GK  VEN Alejandro Araque 2 DF  VEN Carlos Vivas 3 DF  VEN Jean Fran Gutiérrez 4 DF  URU Haibrany Ruiz Díaz 5 MF  ARG Leandro Fioravanti 6 DF  ARG Oliver Benítez 7 FW  VEN Bryan Castillo 8 MF  COL Julián Figueroa 9 FW  VEN Anthony Uribe 10 MF  VEN Carlos Sosa 13 DF  VEN Pablo Camacho 15 MF  VEN Maurice Cova 16 FW  VEN Jesús Hernández

No. Pos. Nation Player 18 MF  VEN Yerson Chacón 20 DF  VEN Carlos Calzadilla 23 MF  VEN Yanniel Hernández 24 MF  COL Carlos Robles 25 FW  ARG Andrés Ríos 28 MF  VEN Gleiker Mendoza 29 DF  VEN Jefre Vargas 30 GK  VEN Edwin Vargas 33 DF  VEN Nelson Hernández 37 DF  VEN Jesús Duarte 50 GK  VEN Jesús Camargo — MF  VEN Daniel Saggiomo

• Tomás Rincón (2008) – First Venezuelan player to play in an important international soccer team such as Juventus FC in 2017. He currently for Torino FC in Italy.
• Cesar "El Maestrico" Gonzalez – Important player with a big important career in different teams around South America such as River Plate, Coritiba, San Luis and other teams of the First Venezuelan league. Currently, he plays in Deportivo La Guaira in Venezuela.
• Daniel Francovig – In the 1987 Copa Libertadores the Uruguayan goalkeeper beat Luis Islas from his own box, with a bounce that misled Independiente's goalkeeper. He scored the best remembered goal by a goalkeeper in the history of football.^{[by whom?]}
• Carlos Maldonado – A former midfielder, obtained a total number of 20 caps for the Venezuela national team, scoring four goals. All his goals came at the 1989 Copa América.

• Luis Miloc (1977–78)
• Esteban Beracochea (1978–83) (Campeón 79 y 81)
• Marcos Calderón (1983)
• Carlos Horacio Moreno (1984–89) (Campeón 84 y 86)
• Richard Páez (1991)
• Walter Roque (1999–01) (Campeón 99-00)
• César Farías (2003–05)
• Manuel Plasencia (2005–07)
• Carlos Maldonado (2007–2010) (Campeón 07-08)
• Jorge Luis Pinto (2010–2011) (Campeón 10-11)
• Jesús Vera (2011)
• Jaime de la Pava (2012)
• Manuel Contreras (2012)
• Daniel Farías (2013–2015) (Campeón 14-15)
• Carlos Maldonado (2015–2016)
• Santiago Escobar (2016-2017)
• Francesco Stifano (2017-2018)
• Álex Pallares (2018)
• Giovanni Pérez (2019)
• Juan Domingo Tolisano (2019-2021) (Campeón 2021)
• Álex Pallares (2022)
• Eduardo Saragó (2022–present)

• Much of the content of this article comes from the equivalent Spanish-language Wikipedia article (retrieved January 15, 2004).

• Official website
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