As part of the collaboration and joint development project between Liga BBVA MX and La Liga Santander, Club Deportivo Guadalajara will return to international activity against a European rival, but this time with a very special and very meaningful trophy on the line.
Athletic Club is already preparing to celebrate an extremely important event next year, 2023: its 125th anniversary. An event that commemorates both the founding of the Club and, above all, the validity and deep roots of a unique entity in the world of soccer. As a prelude to the 125th anniversary celebrations, Athletic Club has organized the Arbol de Gernika Trophy with an equally unique team, Las Chivas Rayadas del Guadalajara, a centennial club that only plays with Mexicans in its ranks.
The Trophy consists of a double-header. The first leg will be played at San Mamés on Sunday, December 11, at 7 PM (local time), taking advantage of the league break due to the World Cup. The return leg, at the Akron Stadium in Guadalajara, to be held on July 16, 2023.
For Jon Uriarte, president of Athletic Club, "it is an honor to be able to welcome Chivas to San Mamés and for the match, which has very unique connotations, to serve as a prelude to the 125th anniversary celebrations".
As Amaury Vergara, president of Chivas, points out, "I think it is a very strong message to the soccer community: these two teams believe in the talent of their people and believe in their traditions and their values".
Tree of Gernika Trophy
The Tree of Gernika Trophy is, in short, a duel between two extraordinary teams, connected by the principle of regionalism that governs their sporting policy. A principle that was common in the origins of soccer and that still remains in amateur sport, but that in the 21st century ratifies Athletic Club and Chivas as two exceptional clubs and turns the two-game duel into a tournament as attractive as it is exciting.
Attractive because of the competitive potential of both teams, and exciting because for the first time in their century-long histories, two clubs united by ties that transcend sporting matters will challenge each other. Not in vain, one of the founders of the city of Guadalajara was the Basque Cristóbal de Oñate; another Basque, Miguel de Ibarra, was one of its first mayors; and there are even those who maintain that the tree on the city's coat of arms is inspired by the tree of Gernika, which is why both clubs have agreed to call the duel with that name, Trofeo Árbol de Gernika (Tree of Gernika Trophy).
Two centenarian, historical teams.
Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the sporting similarities are what most connect Athletic and Chivas, two teams that have never been relegated to the Second Division and whose trophy cabinets are full of trophies. Founded in 1906, Club Deportivo Guadalajara, better known as Chivas, is one of the two teams with the most titles in the history of Mexican soccer. It has more than 40 million fans in the Mexico, the United States and the world. Athletic Club has faced the Mexican national soccer team twice in its history, and has also played against eight different clubs from the Latin American country, but to date it has not had the opportunity to play against its closest Mexican rival, Chivas Rayadas del Guadalajara. It is, therefore, a duel awaited by the fans of both clubs and that settles in some way a pending debt: the meeting of two teams separated by an ocean, but united by the same love for the land and the players who genuinely represent them.
The return leg, in Mexico on July 16, 2023.
The second leg of the Arbol de Gernika Trophy will be played on Mexican soil on July 16, 2023. The match will be played at the Akron Stadium, inaugurated in 2010 with a clash between Chivas and Manchester United of Chicharito, a homegrown player of the red & whites. The winner of the trophy will be decided after the second leg.
Athletic Club vs Chivas tickets now on sale for club members
Athletic Club opens a period from today until Tuesday, November 2, so that members can purchase their tickets at a reduced price, 13€ per seat in any part of the field. Each member can purchase a maximum of two tickets at that price.
Likewise, Gazte Abono and Club Athletic members will be able to purchase tickets at the same reduced price, 13€, but only in the Grada Popular de Animación, the Herri Harmaila.
Once this period has elapsed, members will be able to continue buying tickets at 13€, but the seats not purchased on that date will go on sale to the general public at these prices:
North and South Grandstands, High and Low, 30€.
Main and East Grandstands, High and Low, 40€.
