Full name | Club Deportivo Basconia |
---|---|
Founded | 1913 |
Ground | Polideportivo de Artunduaga, Basauri, Basque Country, Spain |
Capacity | 8,500 |
Chairman | Juan Ignacio Azurmendi |
Manager | Joseba Etxeberria |
League | 3ª – Group 4 |
2014–15 | 3ª – Group 4, 16th |
Club Deportivo Basconia is a Spanish football club based in Basauri, Biscay, in the autonomous community of Basque Country. Founded in 1913 it currently plays in Tercera División – Group 4, holding home games at Estadio de López Cortázar, with an 8,500-seat capacity.
Founded in 1913 as CD Basconia, it reached the national level (Tercera División) thirty years later. It played six seasons in Segunda División (1957–63), but this was before the creation of Segunda División B.
In 1997 Basconia became Basque neighbours Athletic Bilbao's feeder club, not being eligible for promotion if the reserves, Bilbao Athletic, playing in the above level, did not attain the same goal. Several first-team players made the gradual transition before eventually playing in La Liga and European competition.
Basconia’s place in Athletic’s club structure means that the squad changes greatly each season. About half of the players move up to play for Bilbao Athletic, or go out on loan to other local clubs playing at Segunda División B level. They are replaced by graduates, usually 17 or 18 years old, from the previous year’s Juvenil A team. The squad is normally expanded further with new signings from the regions’s youth clubs, most notably Danok Bat and Antiguoko.
Although the players and coaching staff of the main squad are controlled by Athletic Bilbao, Basconia retains its own club committee and staff and operates several youth teams as well an amateur side (Basconia B) who compete in the Preferente de Vizcaya league, two levels below the first team. These other teams play in a separate small stadium in the town called Soloarte.