Chile. A championship so complicated, it deserves a note. There was Campeonato Apertura, followed by Campeonato Oficial, with Copa Chile overlapping Oficial. The official champion was the one of Campeonato Oficial. There were promotions to the higher league after Apertura, based not on results, but on administrative criteria – ‘good venues, meaning large enough stadiums and attendance. Rules differed for different divisions as well as the championship formats. The Apertura in First Division only gave a chance for the winner to compete for the second Libertadores spot after the end of Oficial. The Cup – Chile was and is the only South American country having national cup tournament, although for a short time and involving only the top league clubs – gave bonus points for the winner (2 points) and the losers at the final and the semi-finals (1 point) to be carried to Oficial. The parallel cup for the Second Division involved only 10 clubs, had no final and the only purpose for it was the bring extra revenue for the participants. The Apertura gave bonus points to the top 4 clubs to be carried to Oficial – 2 points for the winner and 1 point for losing finalist and semi-finalists. However, 2 clubs were promoted after Apertura to First Division – cities, judged to be ‘good venues’. Talcahuano and Temuco were the cities, so Huachipato and Green Cross moved up. Huachipato won the Apertura, but could not carry its 2 bonus points to the higher division. On the other hand Green Cross did not go even to the second phase of the championship, but went up anyway. Thus, the top league was enlarged to 22 teams in the middle of the year. Second Division started with 18 teams, but finished with 24. Five Third Division clubs were promoted administratively for Oficial – performance did not matter: Third Division was divided into three groups and no team from Central Group went up. One team from the Northern Group and 4 teams from Southern Group were considered having big enough stadiums and attendance to join the higher division. So far, so good, but some mystery remains – with 2 teams exiting and 5 joining, Second Division had 21 teams at the beginning of Oficial – where three more, to make the final number of 24, came from? So strange and complicated,
Quintero Unido (Quintero) boasts they were Third Division champions in 1983. They were one of the promoted to Second Division teams in mid-year. At this point, they only won a stage of Third Division championship – they finished 1st in the Northern Group. One may understand the club… this was the only time they ended first, but champions? The Third Division championship continued without them and the other 4 promoted teams and ended with official champion: Super Lo Miranda (Lo Miranda). They and second placed Ivan Mayo (Villa Alemana) were promoted to Second Division for the 1983 season.
At the time Quintero Unido finished first in the Northern Group of Third Division, the Apertura of Second Division ended. Huachipato (Talcahuana) won it, finishing on top of the final group. What they got was 2 bonus points, but since they were promoted to play in the top league for the rest of the year, the points meant nothing – they were valid only for the Second Division Oficial championship. Those behind Huachipato – San Luis, Cobresal, and Coquimbo Unido – carried their bonus point to Oficial.
Oficial was all that mattered. The formula was strange – the league was divided into 2 12-team groups in which every team played twice against all others. A second round followed – again in 2 groups, but made differently – the top 6 of the initial groups got the bottom 6 of the other group. This time the teams met only once against each other and after this stage was finished a final aggregate table was made. Every team played 33 games, but there were teams never playing against each other, for they never appeared in the same group. The final table not only decided the league champion, but also decided promotion and relegation. Two teams were directly relegated and the four immediately above them went to play-offs deciding two more relegated. The bottom of the final table was quite strange – Santiago Morning (Santiago) was last with 19 points. This was the most famous club going to Third Division. Colchagua (San Fernando) was 23rd with 23 points – they also used to play top league football. Nuble Unido (Chillan) was 22nd – the name sound unfamiliar, but they changed to it in the middle of the year: originally, this was Nublense, a club playing for years in the top division. Curico Unido (Curico) was 21st with 25 points – the only mid-season newcomer facing relegation. Ovalle (Ovalle), one more former first division member was 20th with 27 points, and San Antonio Unido (San Antonio) was 19th with 28 points. At the relegation play-offs Curico Unido and Ovalle prevailed rather easily and remained in the Second Division. Relegated were: Santiago Morning, Colchagua, Nuble Unido, and San Antonio Unido.
Osorno (Osorno) was very lucky – they ended 18th with 28 points. Safe. But it was only better goal-difference placing them there.
Up the table the newcomers must be mentioned: those, lifted up from Third Division performed surprisingly well. Curuco Unido was the worst, but even they managed to escape relegation back to Third Division. The other four were quite solid: General Velasquez (San Vicente de Tagua Tagua) was 16th, Union Santa Cruz (Santa Cruz) – 14th, Quintero Unido – 13th, and Victoria (Victoria) – 8th.
From the better known members of Second Divison – known, because of years playing top league football,
Concepcion (Concepcion) ended 10th with 36 points,
Union Calera (La Calera) – 9th with 36 points, and
Lota Schwager (Coronel) – 7th with 37 points. Lota Schwager missed a chance for promotion almost unfairly at a glance: Coquimbo Unido was above them thanks to the bonus point carried from otherwise meaningless Campeonato Apertura. If not for this extra point… Well, without this point it would have been the same, Lota Schwager still 7th, on worse goal-difference.
Those, placed from 3rd to 6th place went to promotion play-offs. Coquimbo Unido (Coquimbo) was 6th with 38 points, La Serena (La Serena) – 5th with 40 points, Malleco Unido (Angol) – 4th with 40 points, and Laja (Laja) – 3rd with 42 points.
Deportes Laja desreves a note of praise: practically unknown small club, they had fantastic season, including winning their group in the Cup tournament. It would have been wonderful, if they ended with promotion, they were so close. But they lost.
The other small club, Malleco Unido, also lost – after winning the pay-offs former first division members went up: La Serena and
Coquimbo Unido.
And at the top of Second Division and directly promoted were San Luis (Quillota), 2nd with 44 points, and Cobresal (El Salvador). Both teams played consistently strong season – did well in the Apertura and better in the Oficial. As a result, their bonus points were practically unneeded. But San Luis was only solid, consistent, and squirreling points – Cobresal excelled.
Cobresal was superior – they finished 12 points ahead of San Luis, losing only one match in the campaign. They were 3rd in the meaningless Apertura, did not play in the meaningless cup torunament, and ended first in the both stages of Oficial. At the end they had 23 wins, 9 ties, lost just one match, added a bonus point from Aperura, outscored everybody with 67 goals (the second best was Coquimbo Unido with 58) and had astonishing defense, allowing only 18 goals (the next best defensive record belonged to Malleco Unido – 30 goals). Cobresal were far above anybody in the league and speculations what could have been if two teams were not promoted in the mid-year are futile: Huachipato won the Apertura, but the championship hardly counted for anything and Cobresal did well in it too. Meantime Green Cross was less than impressive and unable to move beyond the opening stage – it was unlikely they would have been very strong later in the year. Cobresal was start from the start and getting stronger as the season progressed. Perhaps what was really strange is that they were not administratively promoted after Apertura, but even this was just fine – not promoted, they were able to earn a trophy: true, champions of only Second Division, but champions.
Because everything was muddy, let repeat the promoted teams: Cobresal (El Salvador), San Luis (Quillota), La Serena (La Serena), and Coquimbo Unido (Coquimbo).