Related ›› Livestream: FC Juárez to unveil official team name
JUÁREZ >> It’s a brave, new start for soccer fans on the border.
Fans submitted names for Juárez’s new professional soccer team and Tuesday, it was unveiled. Fútbol Club Juárez or F.C. Juárez will be Los Bravos.
The big reveal was done as a special news conference that featured young soccer fans, cheerleaders, music, dignitaries and fanfare, along with representatives from MountainStar Sports Group and prominent Juárez families, who own and manage F.C. Juárez.
The team’s new logo features a lime-green and red silhouette of a galloping horse on a black background over a sun on a shield.
“We are Fútbol Club Juárez because of our city and Bravos because of its people’s spirit,” team President Alejandra de la Vega Foster said during the presentation at La Rodadora Museum in south-central Juárez.
De la Vega also co-owns MountainStar Sports Group, the firm that brought the Chihuahuas Triple-A baseball team to El Paso.
She said the name F.C. Juárez will reflect the face of the city and will be representative of the many votes and submissions they received through the team’s website and at locations in Juárez and El Paso in early June. That was when the De la Vega, Fernandez, Muñoz and Talavera families of Juárez, along with the Foster and Hunt families of El Paso, announced that the border city officially had a pro soccer team.
Los Bravos will be part of the Ascenso MX League, the second level of professional soccer in the Mexican league system.
The team initially used the name F.C. Juárez because it was the way it was registered with the Mexican Futbol Federation. However, De la Vega said, they kept it after it was submitted more than 4,000 times out of the 6,200 votes.
“And the nickname that fans most repeated was one that describes our flowing river in the region,” she said.
The Rio Grande is named the Rio Bravo in Mexico.
Before Tuesday’s presentation, cheerleaders fired up the hundreds of fans who packed the museum.
Soccer player Jose Antonio Ramirez — better known as “Tote” — performed tricks with a soccer ball and invited children on stage to join him.
Some of the players, all dressed in red team shirts and jeans, were greeting fans and taking pictures. They were joined by their coach, Sergio Orduña, who was the head coach of the last pro soccer team in Juárez, the Indios.
“Juárez is celebrating,” Mayor Enrique Serrano said. “The passion for soccer returns and that revives Juárez.”
He said the soccer team will bring many benefits, including a better image for Juárez, as well as boost tourism and economic development. “But most importantly, it will inspire children and youngsters to have a fondness for sports,” he said.
Serrano said the owners of F.C. Juárez are civic-minded businesspeople who don’t see the team as a way to make money, but as a way to contribute to the renovation of Juárez.
“To Juarenses, we are left to support this team and this effort because it will bring the city many positive things,” he said.
De la Vega Foster said season tickets will be available Thursday through the team website, and at some S-mart and Del Río Superette stores. Individual game tickets will be available next week at those same locations, including at La Rodadora Museum and Southwest University Park in El Paso.
The Bravos will be play at the stadium of the Universidad Autónoma de Ciudad Juárez. The season begins July 25 with a game against the Lobos of the Universidad Autónoma de Puebla.
Information: fcjuarez.com.
