About

Grupo Desportivo de Chaves, commonly known as Chaves is a Portuguese football club from Chaves currently playing in the LigaPro. They were founded in 1949 and currently play at Estádio Municipal de Chaves with a capacity of 12,000, one of the biggest in the division. Their home kit is red-and-blue striped shirt with blue shorts and socks and the away kit is all white. Their current president is Bruno Carvalho and their manager is Ricardo Soares. Chaves have been in the Portuguese First Division 13 times and had their best finish of fifth-place in the 1989–90 season. They went to Europe in the 1987–88 season where they played in the UEFA Cup, beating Romanian side Universitatea Craiova in the first round but lost in the next round to Hungarian team Budapest Honvéd. Grupo Desportivo de Chaves was founded on 27 September 1949 and is one of the most experienced teams in the Portuguese Second Division, not just because of its old culture, but also many years in the top-flight Primeira Liga, doing quite well and playing in European tournaments, such as the UEFA Cup. Their best ever finish was in the Primeira Liga when they finished fifth in both 1986–87 and 1989–90. In the 1986–87 season, meanwhile, they had fantastic results, beating Sporting Clube de Portugal 2–1 at home in a memorable night at the Estádio Municipal de Chaves. After those fantastic seasons, they finished sixth, seventh and ninth before getting relegated in the 1992–93 season to the Liga de Honra. They returned for another few seasons but then again suffered relegation to the Liga de Honra until 2007, where they eventually got relegated to the Portuguese Second Division: Série A. In the previous season of 2007–08, they finished in fourth place, just missing out on promotion. After a series of great results in 2008–09 that granted the team the lead of Série A, Chaves finally achieved promotion to the second-flight Liga de Honra with an aggregate 1–0 win over Penafiel, the winner of the Portuguese Second Division: Série B in a semi-final playoff. In the playoff final, it was between Chaves and Fátima, in which both were guaranteed promotion to the Liga de Honra, with the final set to determine the champions. Fátima won the match 2–1. Chaves spent the following three years in the third division before being crowned Segunda Divisão champions in 2012–13, thus gaining promotion back to the Segunda Liga. After missing out on promotion to the first division during a thrilling final day of the 2014–15 season, Chaves were promoted the following season back to the top-flight Primeira Liga for the first time in 17 years.