

2013 Copa Libertadores, map of the 38 clubs in the competition





‘COPA LIBERTADORES [fixtures, results, tables]‘ (soccerway.com).

From SabotageTimes.com, from 8 Feb.2013, by Mauricio Savarese, ‘Copa Libertadores: A Guide To The World’s Roughest Football Tournament‘.

…

The 2013 Copa Libertadores (for sponsoship reasons called the 2013 Copa Bridgestone Libertadores de América ) will be the 54th tournament of the Copa Libertadores.

…

The competition, run by CONMEBOL, features qualifying clubs from the 10 South American nations under CONMEBOL’s jurisdiction, plus, since 1998, clubs from Mexico (despite the fact that Mexican football is under the jurisdiction of CONCACAF). 9 of the 11 countries involved are allotted 3 qualifying spots, while Argentina and Brazil get 5 spots. The Holder – SC Corinthians gets an automatic spot, so Brazil has 6 spots in this tournament. The football associations of each country involved have different criteria for awarding their Copa Libertadores spots, and you can see those details here {‘Copa Libertadores/Format/Qualification’ (en.wikipedia.org)}. In general terms, each country’s most recent champion or champions will qualify, plus the best-placed non-champions – with the exception of Mexico, which, since 2011, treats the Copa Libertadores as its second-tier international competition (with the CONCACAF Champions League treated as Mexico’s first-tier international competition [which is illogical on the FMF's part, because there is no fútbol fan on Earth who considers the CONCACAF Champions League title to be a more prestigious title than the much-coveted Copa Libertadores title]).

In Brazil’s case, the 5 qualifiers are first place through 4th place in the previous year’s Campeonato Brasileiro Série A (Fluminense were champions in 2012), plus the current Copa do Brasil winner (Palmeiras were the Brazilian cup winners in 2012). In Argentina’s case, the qualifiers are the previous year’s Clausura [now called Final] champion (Arsenal de Sarandi won it in May, 2012), the previous year’s Apertura [now called Inicial] champion (Vélez Sarsfield won it in December, 2012), and the next best-placed non-qualifiers via aggregate of the previous Clausura [Final] season and Apertura [Incial] season (Newell’s Old Boys and Boca Juniors qualified this way); plus the Copa Sudamericana spot. Tigre qualified this way, as best performance [as a finalist, losing to São Paulo] in the 2012 Copa Sudamericana by an Argentine club not already qualified. [Since 2010, the Argentine Football Association has had the winner, or best-placed non-qualified Argentine team, from the Copa Sudamericana also get into the next year's Copa Libertadores, as the 5th-seeded Argentine team. The Copa Sudamericana is analogous to the UEFA Europa League tournament in Europe, and features clubs who won national cups or who placed in the 2nd-to-14th-place range in their respective leagues.]

The current Copa Libertadores format, which has been in place since 2005, has 38 teams in it. But 12 of those teams must play in a preliminary round (involving a two-legged tie), called the First Stage, in order to get to the 32-team group stage, which is called the Second Stage. The Second Stage is comprised of 8 groups of 4, and the top 2 in each group advance to the Round of 16.

Elements of the map page -

On the map page, a list of the match-ups for the First Stage (aka preliminary round) is just below the top banner, at the upper right-hand corner. Or you can see the matchups at this link…’2013 Copa Libertadores/First Stage‘.

The map page features a location-map of the 38 clubs, and profile boxes for the clubs arranged by country. Each club’s profile box features…the club’s crest and home kit; their stadium(s) and location; how the club qualified for the tournament; the club’s total national professional titles (and the year of their most recent title); the club’s total Copa Libertadores appearances (and how the club fared in their most recent Copa Libertadores appearanace); and the club’s Copa Libertadores titles (and the year of most recent title).

I added one new feature to the map this year – for every metro-area which has more than one team in the competition, I have inserted a small tan box denoting that. Greater Buenos Aires is the metro-area with the most clubs in the 2013 Copa Libertadores- 4 clubs (Tigre, Vélez Sarsfield, Boca Juniors, and Arsenal).

…

Consecutive tournament appearances by club

Fifteen clubs from the 2012 tournament return to the 2013 Copa Libertadores, including reigning champions SC Corinthians of São Paulo, Brazil. The 15 back for a second-straight Copa Libertadores appearance are…

41st appearance, Peñarol (Uruguay).

40th appearance, Club Nacional (Uruguay).

37th appearance, Olimpa (Paraguay).

28th appearance, Bolívar (Bolivia).

22nd appearance, Emelec (Ecuador).

19th appearance, The Strongest (Bolivia).

18th appearance, Universidad de Chile (Chile).

15th appearance, Caracas (Venezuela).

14th appearance, Liberad (Paraguay).

13th appearance, Defensor Sporting (Uruguay).

13th appearance, Vélez Sarsfield (Argentina).

12th appearance, Corinthians (Brazil) – Cup Holder.

12th appearance, Libertad (Paraguay).

6th appearance, Fluminense (Brazil).

3rd appearance, Arsenal [de Sarandí] (Argentina).

.

There are 9 clubs which will be making their 3rd consecutive appearance in the Copa Libertadores (2011, 2012, and 2013) –

Peñarol (URU).

Nacional (URU).

Bolívar (BOL).

Emelec (ECU).

Caracas (VEN).

Libertad (PAR).

Vélez Sarsfield (ARG).

Corinthians (BRA).

Fluminense (BRA).

.

There are 7 clubs which will be making their 4th consecutive appearance in the Copa Libertadores (2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013) –

Nacional (URU).

Bolívar (BOL).

Emelec (ECU).

Caracas (VEN).

Libertad (PAR).

Vélez Sarsfield (ARG).

Corinthians (BRA).

.

There are 3 clubs which will be making their 5th consecutive appearance in the Copa Libertadores (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013) –

Nacional (URU).

Caracas (VEN).

Libertad (PAR).

.

There are two clubs which will be continuing their Copa Libertadores consecutive-appearances streak past 5 straight appearances. Actually, these 2 clubs have made it to the Copa Libertadores a lot more than 5 straight times – Caracas of Venezuela have made it now 10 straight times (from 2004 to 2013, with their best finish in 2009, when Caracas made it to the Quartefinals and lost to Grêmio on the away-goals-rule 2-2).

Club Nacional de Football, Montevideo, Uruguay -

17 consecutive Copa Libertadores appearances (Nacional has qualified for every tournament from the 1997 Copa Libertadores to the 2013 Copa Libertadores)



Photo credit above – Badano24 at flickr.com.

And then there is Club Nacional de Football of Montevideo, Uruguay. Nacional will be making their 17th consecutive Copa Libertadores appearance in 2013. Nacional of course are one of the Big 2 in Uruguay (along with Peñarol). Nacional have won the Copa Libertadores title 3 times, but have not done so for 25 years now (Nacional’s 3 Copa Libertadores titles were won in 1971, 1980, and 1988). The best finish Nacional has had in their current Copa Libertadores-appearances-streak is in 2009, when they made it to the Semifinals (losing 6-0 to eventual 2009 Copa Libertadores champions Estudiantes [of La Plata, Argentina]).

{‘1997 Copa Libertadores‘ (en.wikipedia.org).

“2009 Copa Libertadores‘ (en.wikipedia.org). }

…

2013 Copa Libertadores appearances chart with titles listed for the 38 clubs in the 2013 tournament

Below is a chart I put together that shows all 38 clubs in the 2013 Copa Libertadores, placed in order of all-time appearances; along with titles and date of last title listed.



___

Thanks to FootieMap.com, for finding stadium-locations of various clubs, http://www.footiemap.com/.

Thanks to RSSSF – I used this list for all-time Copa Libertadores appearances chart, ‘Copa Libertadores 1960-2010 Club Histories’ at rsssf.com .

Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org, ‘2013 Copa Libertadores‘.