The C.D. Tenerife receives the Gold Medal of the Canary Islands in the season of its centenary. It is a celebration that could be doubled by the possibility that the team has of being promoted to the First Division, a competition in which it last participated in the 2008/09 League. Its president, Miguel Concepción, analyzes the exciting present and looks into a future marked by stability and evolution.
Among the distinctions that have been adorning the centenary year of CD Tenerife, the Canary Islands Gold Medal 2022. “It is the recognition of one hundred years of history and all the people who have been part of this institution since its foundation.” These are the words of the president who has been in charge of the entity since February 2006. Miguel Concepción analyzes the present –enriched by the imminent participation of the team in the promotion for promotion to First Division– and looks forward to a promising future due to the economic stability in which the club is establishing itself, with projects close to materializing, such as the improvement works of the City Sporty.
Concepción (La Palma, 1954) can boast of directing a “healthy” Tenerife, which is in a very different situation from the one found when he assumed the responsibility of occupying a position that had been left deserted as a result of an economic and sports crisis. “In 2006, the liabilities were 54 million euros and there was no capacity to face the debt, but with good business management and being quite austere in expenses, we have been able to look to the future with optimism, seeking sporting success”, explains the leader referring to a debt that “is around 10 million euros” and that he considers “normal” for a professional football club. “Many others would like to be like this”, ensures. “Tenerife has a heritage and we must not forget that the squad has its value, so that debt does not represent any burden when it comes to advancing in the search for the objectives that we have programmed,” he adds.
The presence of the team in the qualifying rounds to make the leap to the highest category is not that it was scheduled, but it has been a goal at each start of the course. At last, the squad designed by Juan Carlos Cordero and trained by Luis Miguel Ramis, is four games away from promotion to the First Division, a scenario that “a plus” in the centenary year. “The finishing touch is missing,” says Concepción, convinced that Tenerife “now has to” complete a solid season in the Second Division to return to a First Division in which it last competed in the 2009/2010 League. «We are not lacking in enthusiasm, and the degree of commitment on the part of the staff, the board of directors and everyone, is maximum. We are united and we will leave everything to take advantage of this opportunity that we have”, he promises, being optimistic, since “the team arrives at a good moment” to the decisive stage, despite the fact that injuries such as those of Larrea, Shashoua or Álex Muñoz mean that the coach “cannot count on all the potential” at this stage of the calendar. “But the team has shown that it is competitive”it states.
Concepción affirms that the club is healthy, because it can handle a debt of 10 million
In parallel, The 100-year-old season will bring with it an “important moment” scheduled for the last quarter: the inauguration of the remodeled Ciudad Deportiva Javier Pérez. Improvement works are ongoing and should be completed in October. “Everything is moving forward to have an infrastructure that will put us at the level of the first teams at the national level and that will be for the new generations. We will be able to finish the works in October 2022 and its inauguration will be another important moment within the celebration of the centenary, in collaboration with the Cabildo de Tenerife », he details.
And what will happen to Heliodoro Rodríguez López? Will the team continue to compete at home in its current stadium in the long term? The president hopes that Tenerife will get to release one that is its own or for exclusive use. “The stadium is as old as it is, it won’t be long before its centenary is celebrated”, says the entity’s highest representative. «It has developed in different phases throughout its history and it is still an installation with obsolete tints. Nowadays, new stadiums are built with other perspectives, even on a commercial level to obtain income. I know that the Cabildo is making an effort to comply with maintenance. And we are moving forward. Thanks to this, we can hold official matches. For example, an important action was carried out to install the new lighting. We are very grateful to the Cabildo. But this does not mean that we have forgotten the possibility of building another stadium. In the club many movements are being made in silence. Let’s not forget that there are companies that are willing to invest. There are many contacts and we are not giving up on having a new stadium. There is a predisposition on the part of the city councils of the metropolitan area, of the Cabildo itself… The idea is not parked. Things are being done, there are small advances. The club does not turn its back on him nor is it remaining as a simple spectator. We want to be protagonists and we are going to work with the administrations so that in the not too distant future a project appropriate to the current times can be carried out, so that any international championship can be held on the Island. We are going slowly, but we are not standing still, ”says the president.
Ensures that the plan to build a new stadium, own or exclusive use, “is not parked”
The centenary Tenerife looks to the First Division and also thinks about the modernization of its facilities, but it does not leave aside the local product, a quarry that is no longer just a children’s thing. “We can think that, more in the short term than in the long term, the essence of the Canarian player will be provided to the first team”, guarantees Concepción before highlighting that “through the Foundation”, the club opens up “to women’s football with a steady advance. Every girl who has the desire to play soccer has open doors.”
After 16 years in office and with “strength” to move forward, Concepción looks back to the days when he became just another Tenerife player without suspecting that he would end up becoming the club’s president. “In La Palma I was always closely linked to football,” he recalls, placing himself at the origin of his emotional bond with the team. «When I arrived in Tenerife, in 1983, I met a team that was in Second B. The stadium had that wooden stand. I remember the games at night, with those lights. The level that the team had was very different from what I had seen in La Palma. And I got excited. Later, when Javier Pérez joined the club and Tenerife began to grow, the entity became a public limited company and I bought my shares to have the right to take out the pass. That’s how I started. From 1983 to today, my life has been closely linked to the club”, a centennial club.
