COQUIMBO UNIDO - THIRD SHIRT 2024
Club de Deportes Coquimbo Unido were founded on 30 August 1958 in the port city of Coquimbo, on Chile's northern coast. Known as Los Piratas (The Pirates), Los Aurinegros (The Gold and Blacks) and, rather brilliantly, El Barbón (The Beardy Man), the club play their home matches at the Estadio Municipal Francisco Sánchez Rumoroso, an 18,750-capacity stadium built in the shape of a ship in tribute to the city's seafaring and pirate heritage.
The 2024 season, during which this eye-catching third shirt was worn, was Coquimbo's third consecutive year back in the Primera División since their promotion in 2022. Under manager Esteban González, the club led a promising first half of the campaign, sitting just a point behind leaders Universidad de Chile at the halfway stage on 31 points. The picture changed dramatically after playmaker Luciano Cabral departed for León in Mexico's Liga MX during the mid-season transfer window: Coquimbo went 11 matches without a win immediately afterwards and managed only 14 points from their final 15 games, eventually finishing 8th with 45 points.
There was continental football to enjoy too. Coquimbo reached the Copa Sudamericana group stage in 2024, beating Universidad Católica 2-0 in the qualifying round before being drawn into a group alongside Argentina's Racing, Paraguay's Sportivo Luqueño and Brazil's Red Bull Bragantino. They finished third, exiting after the group stage, but not before giving some of South America's bigger names a game.
Cabral's departure, and the goals and creativity that went with it, defined this shirt's story more than any individual replacement did: the second-half collapse in league form was a direct consequence of losing their best player mid-season, a reminder of how thin the margins can be for a club competing above its historical station. It is a shirt from a season of two contrasting halves, and in hindsight, just a year before the club's first-ever Primera División title arrived in 2025.
Follow the club on X: @coquimbounido
