La Liga winners to the third-tier of Spanish football: How Deportivo La Coruna are plotting a return to the top after years of struggle | OneFootball

Deportivo La Coruña, once Champions League semi-finalists, are now in Spain’s Segunda División, and aiming to find a way back to La Liga. But what went wrong at the club, and how are they rebuilding the foundations?

Hayters TV spoke to their new CEO, Massimo Adalberto Benassi, who detailed what has been happening at the club in the last few years, and how they are planning get back to the top.

Depor were relegated from La Liga in 2018, after entering administration in 2013 with debts of over €150 million. The difficult financial situation paired with frequent managerial changes, anger from fans, and poor recruitment in the market meant the once great club were at one of their lowest points in the club’s history.

But it would get even worse. After two seasons in the Segunda División, they were relegated to the third tier of Spanish football in 2020. It was a truly unthinkable fall-off for a team that had enjoyed so much success over the previous three decades, which included a La Liga title win in 2000, and reaching the Champions League semi-final in 2004.

But now they are turning things around. After four years in the third division, they got promoted to the second tier last campaign and are enjoying a stable season under the management of Óscar Gilsanz, sitting in 11th.

Their ambition is clear. To get back to the first tier of Spanish football, but Benassi is reluctant to put a timeline on it given what has happened previously.

“If you ask the owner, he will say as soon as possible,” he said. “It’s really difficult to put a timeline on it.

“Of course we want to be back in the first division as soon as possible, but we don’t want to die in the process. For us it is more important to be sustainable and clever, to grow with the project and do it step-by-step.”

The club are based in Galicia, and have traditionally focused on scouting the region for talent. But Benassi explained how their reach now expands far beyond that.

“Our scouts are monitoring all of Europe by video and when we make shortlists the scouts travel to check and then double-check the players. Data is a really important part of our football department.

“We have a technology director who is in charge of connecting the sports side with the non sports side. We use it (data) a lot, and in the future I think we will use it and improve with it even more.”

Expanding on how Los Blanquiazules are using data, Benassi pointed to how the likes of English clubs Brentford and Brighton have had success doing the same thing.

“We talk a lot with other clubs who are using data. You have clubs like Brighton or Brentford in England, who we know are using data a lot. I don’t think we are at that stage, and maybe it’s not our model.

“You cannot copy and paste from one club to another. We try to keep a balance. We don’t sign a player just because the sporting director says he is top, and we don’t sign a player because the data says he is top. We try to keep a balance between what the technical side of the club is saying, what the data side is saying, and what our CFO is saying.”

Deportivo La Coruña may still be finding their feet in the Segunda División, but the foundations for a return to La Liga are there.

The signs of late have been encouraging. They have lost just twice since the turn of the year and while they have drawn a few too many for their liking, they have shown they are incredibly difficult to beat.

With a club of their history, a devoted fanbase, and the right long-term vision, a top-flight comeback may not be immediate, but it feels more like a question of when, rather than if.