Atlante heads to the beach
By: Chris | May 15th, 2007Atlante, one of Mexico City’s four teams, will be moving to Cancun permanently for the upcoming season.
The Potros de Hierro have played in the Azteca Stadium for the last few years, after their former home, Estadio Neza ‘86, was deemed unusable for the Primera Division.
The move is reminiscent of Necaxa’s a few years ago, another tenant of the Azteca who drew poorly and promptly moved to Aguascalientes.
My take:
A good move for Atlante, but a little surprising. Acapulco has been courting a team for years and I figured that they’d move there if any beach resort town.
But it’s a move that Atlante had to make. They were in the same situation as Necaxa, they couldn’t draw in the Azteca, as only America can. It’s not their fault that the Neza ‘86 is unusable. They were pretty much forced to move to the monstrous Azteca, a stadium that they’d never be able to sell out.
But this makes the third disappearance of teams from Mexico City in the recent years, two of whom moved onto previously untapped markets.
Early this decade, the much-beloved Toros Neza folded after being relegated, thanks to financial mishandling.
But with teams like America, Pumas and Cruz Azul in the capital city, it’s hard for any other team to break through and make a name for themselves.
Hopefully Cancun will suit them well. The emergence of local boy Carlos Vela (property of Arsenal, currently playing with Salamanca in Spain’s Segunda Division) has raised the profile of soccer in the town, and maybe they can get some of the gringo tourists out to a game.
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That is very interesting. I didn’t know that clubs moved in Mexico like that. Cancun seems like an odd choice considering all the alternative forms of entertainment there. What are their fans in Mexico City saying about this?
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