Deportivo Alaves

Club Deportivo Alavés is a football club in the Spanish La Liga, the top division of European football. The home games are played in the Estadio Mendizorrotza with 19,900 seats. The blue striped shirts are paired with white trousers or shorts and the club is sponsored by Nike, which also provides the shirts for other teams such as Real Madrid Fútbol School (the club's academy). Founded as Sport Friends on January 21, 1921, just three years after the first Spanish Associations Act was passed, which regulated the clubs' cup competitions, this new sports organization adopted its current name: CD ALAVS. Despite being the third biggest club in the Basque Country behind Athletic Bilbao and Real Sociedad, Deportivo Alaves managed promotion to La Liga for the first time. In the mid-1980s the proud team faced bankruptcy, but with the help of A HB's neighbors they averted it until the sale of Andoni Zubizarreta later brought them out again on good terms. The story here shows how two teams came together, one of which went bankrupt while the other saved itself by selling off a future goalkeeping talent who went on to become a key player in the Spain national team.

The squad is no stranger to success. The club was most successful between 1998 and 2003, when they played in the top flight for five consecutive years and reached the UEFA Cup final once! They defeated Rosenborg Trondheim (1-1), Inter Milan (3-3) and 1. FC Kaiserslautern 5 times before eventually suffering a 4-0 home defeat on the road to glory - a result set on Thanksgiving Day 2006 was all too possible. 2nd Graet quarterfinal game.

Liverpool's son Jordi Cruyff scored an added-time equalizer for a 4-4 draw at the Westfalenstadion.