Monagas Sport Club is a Venezuelan professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

team competing at the top level, the

Primera División Venezolana Primera may refer to * Nissan Primera, a car * Primera Air, a former airline * Primera división (disambiguation), multiple top division football leagues * Primera, Texas, a town in Cameron County, Texas * Alí Primera Ely Rafael Primera Ros ...

. It is based in

Maturín Maturín () is a city in Venezuela, the capital of the Venezuelan state of Monagas and a centre for instrumental exploration and development of the petroleum industry in Venezuela. The metropolitan area of Maturín has a population of 401,384 inha ...

. Their home stadium is the

Estadio Monumental de Maturín The Estadio Monumental de Maturín (Monumental Stadium of Maturin) is the largest stadium in Venezuela by seating capacity, with 52,000 spectators. It was one of the venues of the 2007 Copa America. It is also the home stadium of the Monagas Spo ...

. The club received the nickname of “''Los Guerreros del Guarapiche''” (The Warriors from the Guarapiche), because of the never giving up mentality of its players and the name of the river ( River Guarapiche) which crosses the city where the team has its headquarters.

History

Monagas Sport Club was founded on 23 September 1987 by Joaquín (Fariñas) da Silva, Ramón Ramírez, Enrique Polo, Rubén León, Francisco "Paco" Espinoza and Luis Enrique Rodríguez. Its first official match was against "Unión Deportivo Puerto la Cruz" on 22 May 1988; however the club had had friendly matches against the teams "Atlético Cumaná”, “Cachorros del Tigrito” and “Mariscales de Sucre”. The team started as a second division team and its first official league game, which it won with a final score of 4–0, was against the "Unión Deportivo

Puerto La Cruz Puerto La Cruz () is a port city located in Anzoátegui State, in Venezuela. It is the seat of the Juan Antonio Sotillo Municipality. The city has road connections to the state capital, Barcelona, to Lecheria and to Guanta. Geography The cit ...

". The team participated in the Venezuelan second division until 1990 when the club was promoted to the first division. Since then Monagas Sport Club have tried to remain in this division.

Crisis in the season 2006–07

Monagas Sport Club obtained awful results in the season 2006–2007 of Venezuela's first division. As the consequence of this bad patch three previous coaches (Franco Fasciana, Del Valle Rojas and Bernardo Redín) had led the club before the arrival of Alí Cañas. Some football players resigned to the team before the conclusion of the tournament and Ramón Caballero, president of the club, gave up. Monagas Sport Club finished in the relegation places at the end of the season, but the club won a reprieve when the Primera División Venezolana decided to expand from 10 to 18 teams, thus allowing the two teams in the relegation places to remain in the league.

2017

In 2017, Monagas participated in the Primera División and qualified to the knockout stage of the Torneo Apertura, finishing 6th in the regular season. In the quarter-finals, they defeated Zamora 6–2 on aggregate and went on to the semi-finals, where they defeated

Carabobo Carabobo State (, ) is one of the 23 states of Venezuela, located in the north of the country, about two hours by car from Caracas. The state capital city is Valencia, which is also the country's main industrial center. The state's area is and ...

on away goals after a 1–1 draw on aggregate. In the final, Monagas faced

Caracas Caracas ( , ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas (CCS), is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the northern p ...

. The first leg was played at

on 25 June, with a 1–0 win for the home side. On the second leg in

on 2 July, Monagas lost 2–1, but won on away goals (2–2 on aggregate), securing Monagas' first title in short tournaments and their first qualification to the

Copa Libertadores The CONMEBOL Libertadores, also known as Copa Libertadores de América (), is an annual continental club football competition organized by CONMEBOL since 1960. It is the highest level of competition in South American club football. The tournam ...

. Later, on the Serie Final, against Torneo Clausura champions

Deportivo Lara ''Deportivo'' (Spanish, 'sporting') may refer to: * Deportivo de La Coruña, commonly known as simply Deportivo, a Spanish football club * Déportivo, a French rock band * Deportivo (Mexicable), an aerial lift station in Ecatepec, Mexico * Deport ...

, Monagas lost the first leg in Maturín on 13 December, 1–0, but won the second leg in Cabudare on 17 December, 2–0, becoming the Venezuelan champions for the first time, winning the Serie Final 2–1 on aggregate.

Stadium

The

is a football stadium located in the city of Maturin, Monagas state. It is the biggest stadium in Venezuela with a capacity of 51,796 spectators. It is competing for the football matches that Monagas Sport Club home game. It was built to host the Copa America Venezuela 2007. ''El Monumental'' was inaugurated on June 24, 2007, where they were the opening game between the Monagas Sport Club and

Zamora Fútbol Club Zamora Fútbol Club is a Venezuelan football club in Barinas and playing in the Venezuelan Primera División. It plays its home matches at the Estadio Agustín Tovar. History Zamora Fútbol Club was founded in 2002. After being in the Second ...

home team winning 2–0 with goals from

Edder Farías Edder José Farías Martínez (born 12 April 1988) is a Venezuelan footballer who plays as a forward for Monagas. He began his career at Monagas, playing four Primera División Venezolana seasons before a transfer to Caracas in 2012. He has ...

. Monagas Sport Club played from 1987 to 2007 at

Estadio Alexander Botinni Estadio Alexander Botinni is a multi-use stadium in Maturín, Venezuela. It is currently used mostly for football matches and is the home stadium of Monagas Sport Club Monagas Sport Club is a Venezuelan professional football team competing at th ...

in Maturín.

Sponsor

''La Lotería de Oriente'' (a public lottery from Maturín) is the main sponsor of Monagas Sport Club. For last years the president of the lottery, Willy Farías, has been in charge of the presidency of the club.

Controversy over the uniform, the logo and the name of the club

The colors of the Monagas Sport Club's uniform are blue and maroon. The uniform and crest are largely based on those of

FC Barcelona Futbol Club Barcelona (), commonly known as FC Barcelona and colloquially as Barça (), is a professional Football club (association football), football club based in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain, that competes in La Liga, the top flight of ...

. These colors were proposed by Francisco "Paco" Espinoza, a former vice-president of the club, in 1988. In 2006 Ramón Caballero, the former president of the team, and other members of the board of directors suggested the colors of the uniform, the logo and the name of the club should be changed. According to them, the uniform and crest should not copy a foreign club and the name of the team should be written in Spanish. Many supporters of Monagas Sport Club are opposed to this idea as they consider the red and maroon colors, crest and current name to be a part of the club's identity.

Honours

* Primera División: 1 (

2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...

) :* Torneo Apertura: 1 (

) :* Torneo Clausura: 0 *

Segunda División The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Segunda División, commonly known as Segunda División or La Liga 2, and officially known as LaLiga HyperMotion for sponsorship reasons, is the men's second professional association football division of the Spa ...

: 1 (2015)

Performance in CONMEBOL competitions

: 4 appearance ::

2018 Events January * January 1 – Bulgaria takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, after the Estonian presidency. * January 4 – SPLM-IO rebels loyal to Chan Garang Lual start a raid against Juba, capital of ...

: Group stage ::

2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...

: Qualifying stage ::

2023 Catastrophic natural disasters in 2023 included the Lists of 21st-century earthquakes, 5th-deadliest earthquake of the 21st century 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquakes, striking Turkey and Syria, leaving up to 62,000 people dead; Cyclone Freddy ...

: Group stage ::

2025 So far, the year has seen the continuation of major armed conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Sudanese civil war (2023–present), Sudanese civil war, and the Gaza war. Internal crises in Bangladesh post-resignation v ...

: Second stage *

Copa Sudamericana The CONMEBOL Sudamericana, also known as Copa Sudamericana (; ), is an annual international club football competition organized by CONMEBOL, the governing body of football in South America, since 2002. It is the second-most prestigious club com ...

: 4 appearances ::

2002 The effects of the September 11 attacks of the previous year had a significant impact on the affairs of 2002. The war on terror was a major political focus. Without settled international law, several nations engaged in anti-terror operation ...

: Second stage ::

2003 2003 was designated by the United Nations as the International Year of Fresh water, Freshwater. In 2003, a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition 2003 invasion of Iraq, invaded Iraq, starting the Iraq War. Demographic ...

: Preliminary round ::

2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

: First stage ::

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

: First stage

Players

Current first team squad

Presidents and managers

Presidential history

Monagas Sport Club has had numerous presidents over the course of its history, some of whom have been owners of the club while others have been honorary presidents. Here is a complete list of them.

Managerial history

Below is a list of Monagas SC coaches from 1987 until the present day.

References

External links

* * {{Primera División Venezolana Football clubs in Venezuela Association football clubs established in 1987 1987 establishments in Venezuela Maturín