Huachipato FC

In 1947, CD Huachipato was officially notarized, and the first official recorded game was played. The original fans were the local company employees of the steel industry in Huachipato. It took a few years for the club to achieve its first successes, obtaining regional championships in 1956 and 1964.

In its early seasons, "the Steelers" (Acereros), as they are known, were quite satisfactory in the second division. The 1965 debut was against Municipal de Santiago with a 3–0 victory.

After 36 games the standings would show Huachipato second with 46 points, 3 points less than that of Ferrobádminton another second-division team that took the championship and thus passage (which is how it was granted in those years) to the First Division.

However, a year later (1966), the Steelers managed promotion to the first division, after winning the second division champions Chile with 49 points, they remained well above teams like Coquimbo (42 points) and San Antonio (39) who stayed with the second and third place respectively after thirty games.

With only two years in the professionalism of Talcahuano, Huachipato was installed in the top-flight professional football in Chile, La Primera División.

With a tie on a goal, as local and against Audax Italiano, the "Steelers" debuted in the first division. In the first season of the first division, Huachipato had an acceptable term in sixth place among 18 teams, although the tournament was on two wheels. The following years were quiet for steel, culminating their shares in the mid-high zone of the standings. However, a few years after this change, Huachipato won the 1974 First Division Football Championship, with this triumph they are the only Chilean Football team from the south of Chile to obtain the title.

1974 was a year that many Huachipato fans will never forget, after 34 matches played, Huachipato had to beat Aviación to become champions in their last match, and they did it, Moisés Silva scored the only goal that crowned Huchipato champions that year.

Since then the club has never won any other title, but it has always caused difficulties for the big teams when playing against Huachipato, especially in the Estadio Las Higueras, their former home ground.

From the end of the 1990s, Huachipato was characterized by a club trainer of players from lower divisions. Examples of these are important values steelmakers who emerged from the quarry as Roberto Cartes, Cristian Uribe, Rodrigo Rain, Cristián Reynero, Rodrigo Millar, Mario Salgado, Héctor Mancilla, Gonzalo Jara, Pedro Morales, Mauricio Arias, among others.

As for sporting achievements, reached the Semi-Finals in the Torneos Apertura in the years 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006. In addition, since the end of the 1990s, the Huachipato classification achieved an international tournament and the Copa Sudamericana 2006 and their second championship in 38 years, after defeating Unión Española in the 2012 Chilean Clausura Tournament final.

From its foundation in 1947 and until 1966, Huachipato wore a red shirt, blue pants and white socks uniform in the same vein as the Chile national football team. Upon Huachipato's first promotion to the top flight in 1967, the team switched to its current black and blue uniform, inspired by Inter Milan's colours.[4]

Huachipato's name is derived from the Mapudungun eponomyous term that coined the area where the team is located, with the term meaning "Bird-catching trap".[5]

Huachipato's badge was inspired by the Steelmark logo owned by the American Iron and Steel Institute, bearing a similarity to the NFL's Pittsburgh Steelers logo, given both teams steelmaking roots.[6]

• Record Primera División victory — 6–0 v. Aviación (1975) and La Calera (2014)
• Record Primera División defeat — 0–7 v. Palestino (1978)
• Record Copa Chile victory — 12–1 v. Luchador de Coñaripe (2010)
• Record Copa Chile defeat — 0-4 v. Osorno (1989) and Unión Española (1990)
• Record Copa Libertadores victory — 4-0 v. Caracas (2013)
• Record Copa Libertadores defeat — 2-7 v. Unión Española (1974)
• Record Copa Sudamericana victory — 3-0 v. Antofagasta (2021)
• Record Copa Sudamericana defeat — 0-5 v. Rosario Central (2021)
• Record Top Scorer — 72 goals, Héctor Mancilla (2000–2005, 2015)
• Most Appearances — 329 matches, Gabriel Sandoval (2002–2014)
• Highest home attendance  — 43,340 v. Colo-Colo (12 November 1967, at Estadio Regional de Concepción)
• Primera División Best Result  — Champions (1974, 2012 C)
• Copa Chile Best Result  — Runner-up (2013–14)

Up until 2015, Huachipato was a multisports club, maintaining basketball, karate, taekwondo, artistic roller skating, roller hockey, tennis, table tennis, volleyball, and futsal branches.

Huachipato's supporters, nicknamed the Acereros, largely come from its home city of Talcahuano, with groups of fans coming from cities belonging to the Greater Concepción conurbation. A smaller group of fans reside in Santiago, often attending away games.

Huachipato's main rivals are Naval, who are also based in Talcahuano and with whom Huachipato contest the Clásico Chorero , and Deportes Concepción, from the neighbouring city and regional capital, with whom Huachipato contest the Clasico del Gran Concepción.[7]

Huachipato and O'Higgins F.C. have a longstanding mutual friendship, originating from the Tomé tragedy of 2013, where 16 travelling O'Higgins fans tragically lost their lives in a road accident in Tomé, while returning from Estadio CAP after a 2-0 O'Higgins victory.[8] In every fixture played between both teams since, both clubs organize a memorial ceremony previous to each match. Huachipato installed a permanent commemorative plaque at Estadio CAP in 2018, in remembrance of the tragedy,[9] and since 2022, both clubs symbolically contest the Copa 16 (Trophy of the 16), in honour of the departed fans.[10]

In Italics, the caretaker managers of Huachipato. In bold, the managers who won a title with Huachipato.

• Gatica Wierman, Héctor (2019). Almanaque del Fútbol Chileno. Clubes. Santiago: Hueders.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Club Deportivo Huachipato.

• (in Spanish) Official website
• (in Spanish) Huachipato at the ANFP official website
• (in Spanish) Huachipato's ESPN profile