Malaga Football Club

Lying on the south coast of Spain, the Andalusian city of Malaga is home to Malaga Football Club, or, as it is known in Spain, Malaga Club de Fútbol. Founded in April 1904 and based at the La Rosaleda ground, the club currently plays in the Spanish La Liga, and in the 2013-2014 season they finished 11^th. The club has not always enjoyed its position in La Liga, but over recent years, Malaga Footbal Club has gone from strength to strength.

• Having enjoyed 33 seasons in the Spanish La Liga, Malaga Football Club is a prominent team in Spanish football that has grown in success in the past few years
• Malaga Football Club has an Academy and a youth team, and the club aims to improve football provision for young people in the city itself, as well as in the province of Malaga

In former times, the club was called Club Atlético Malagueño, and was intended to be the reserve team for Club Deportivo Malaga. However there were several years in which CA Malagueño was performing better than CD Malaga, who also had financial difficulties, which sparked the need for a referendum in December 1993. Consequently in 1994 the club’s members voted in favour of becoming Malaga Club Fútbol, which remains today.

At the start of the Millennium, Malaga were in the middle of La Liga, and nor were they contenders for a place in the Champions League. Nevertheless they certainly rose to a higher level of prominence in the Spanish football world under the leadership of Joaquín Peiró at this time, and the club did reach the quarter-finals of the UEFA Europa League in 2003, following their victory in the since-disbanded UEFA Intertoto Cup in 2002. A particularly memorable moment in the club’s history was a 5-1 victory against FC Barcelona in 2003 under the management of Juan de Ramos, who unfortunately left soon after.

This success in 2003 was followed by several years of disappointment for Malaga Football Club in which they were relegated, and struggled to re-enter La Liga. However in the 2007-2008 season, the team managed to be promoted to the top league as runners-up following a victory over CD Tenerife, and have managed to comfortably stay there ever since.

The club was bought by sheikh Abdullah ben Nasser Al Thani in 2010, and has enjoyed much success since. In the 2010-2011 season Malaga FC won five of their Spanish La Liga matches in a row; a previously unheard of feat, and finished the season in 11^th position.  The following season, in 2011-2012, Malaga were particularly successful, having finished 4^th in La Liga and, for the first time, qualifying for the 2012-2013 UEFA Champions League, where they were knocked out in the quarter-finals. More recently, Malaga Football Club has struggled due to a ban from the UEFA League for debt problems which resulted in the club not being able to compete in the 2013-2014 UEFA season, although they finished strongly in La Liga.

Malaga Football Club is hugely successful, particularly when making the sport more accessible. They not only have their reserve team, but also at least six youth teams who play regularly. La Academia, the Club’s organisation that takes responsibility for training the youngsters, is also planning to build a new sports complex in the city-centre, as well as various training grounds around the province to increase the number of people playing the sport. The aim is to make Malaga a principal training facility for youths both nationally and internationally.