SEVILLA
History
Romantic, romanticised Seville offers all the cliches of Andalucia – and thus of Spain as a whole: bullfighting, flamenco, tapas bars and fervent religious processions.
As you might expect, there is also fierce football rivalry in the Andalucian capital, and the meetings between the Betis and Sevilla clubs are classics of the Spanish calendar.
The derby has been one of the most violent in recent years. In a 2005 clash at Sevilla the two sets of fans fought outside the ground while, on the pitch, the coaching staffs came to blows. In February last year at Betis’ ground, then Sevilla coach Juande Ramos was knocked out by a missile thrown by a home fan. As punishment, Betis were ordered to play three home games elsewhere.
The next derby is at Betis on the weekend of May 10-11, in the penultimate league round. High-flying Sevilla emphatically won the first league encounter of the season, 3-0. Relegation-threatened Betis will be desperate for revenge.
Needless to say, tickets will be hard to come by. Alternative, attractive fixtures coming up include Betis v Barcelona on the weekend of March 29-30 and Sevilla v Villarreal on the weekend of April 5-6.
The Sevilla Football Club was formed in 1905 by employees of the nearby Rio Tinto mines. The directorship comprised members of the landowning classes. When one director refused to hire a factory worker to work at the club there was a revolt and dissident members left to form Betis. The latter club then merged with another club, Sevilla Balompie (an old Spanish name for football), in 1914. Having made King Alfonso XIII their honorary president, they became Real (Royal) Betis Balompie. The first derby took place in October 1915, Sevilla winning 4-3.
Both clubs have moved around town since their early days at the Prado de San Sebastian. Nowadays, Sevilla are in the commercial district of Nervion, their Sanchez Pizjuan stadium surrounded by fast highways and a contemporary shopping mall; Betis’ Manuel Ruiz de Lopera stadium is in the working-class Heliopolis district, south of the city centre. De Lopera, Betis’ owner, turned down the chance to share the city’s Olympic stadium, built on the 1992 Expo site of La Cartuja, with Sevilla. As a consequence the Olympic sees little football action. The most notable game of recent years was the UEFA Cup Final in 2003, when Porto beat Celtic. The city witnessed a peaceful invasion by 80,000 Celtic fans.
The goals of striker Oliver Ward pushed Sevilla to their only league title in 1946. Two years later they won the Spanish Cup. But that was the end of the silverware until their recent run. Indeed, Sevilla were more renowned for offering huge salaries to players (notably Diego Maradona) who failed to shine.
The change came with the arrival of Jose Maria del Nido as president. Star forward Jose Antonio Reyes was sold to Arsenal to help balance the books, and investment was made in young players. The fruit has been a succession of trophies at home and in Europe. The whites took their first trophy for nearly 60 years with a 4-0 win over Middlesbrough in the 2006 UEFA Cup Final, and retained the Cup last season, this time beating Espanyol in the Final. Sevilla also won the European Super Cup in 2006 and the Spanish Cup and Super Cup in 2007. They were even in with a shout of taking the league crown on the final day of last season, but lost while Real Madrid, the new champions, and Barcelona both won.
There was tragedy at the start of this season when defender Antonio Puerta collapsed during the opening league match against Getafe and died in hospital a few days later. But despite that and the departure of Ramos for Tottenham in the autumn, Sevilla have managed to stay in the upper echelons of La Liga and progressed to the knockout stages on their Champions League debut.
Betis have also won the league title only once, a shock triumph in 1935 under former Manchester United player Patrick O’Connell, while they have two Spanish Cup wins, in 1977 and 2005. But the rest of their history is steeped in mediocrity and battling in the lower leagues. De Lopera brought in big names – an unhappy Denilson springs to mind – and overhauled the club’s modest stadium, somewhat immodestly lending it his own name. But despite all that, Betis were relegated in 2000, though they subsequently bounced back.
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