Ecuador. After a full-league season, the top 8 qualified to the second stage or Octogonal Final. The bottom 8 finished their season after the initial stage, the last in it – relegated. The champion of Second Division was promoted. The final stage proceeded again as standard league championship, but the top three teams in the first stage started it with bonus points: 3 for the 1st placed, 2 for the 2nd placed, and 1 point for the 3rd placed. No other points were carried over to the second stage and who ended with most points in it was the new Ecuadorian champion. Rather simple and easily understood formula for South American championship.
Macara (Ambato) won the Second Division championship and was promoted to the top league this year.
First Division first stage.
After 30 rounds were played Manta Sport (Manta) was last with 17 points and was relegated. The club changed names a few times, so the logo is not from the time when the club was named Manta Sport.
America ended 15th with 19 points. There is some confusion here – America (Quito) is listed in the final table and this photo shows America (Machala). The same club or other club? Hard to tell…
Audaz Octubrino (Machala) – 14th with 21 points.
Tecnico Universitario (Ambato) – 13th with 21 points.
Deportivo Cuenca (Cuenca) – 12th with 23 points.
Deportivo Quevedo (Quevedo) – 11th with 27 points.
Emelec (Guayaquil) – 10th with 27 points. This was a surprise – Emelec out of the championship race.
LDU (Quito) – 9th with 33 points. With them ends the unlucky group which did not qualify to the final stage and finished the season.
Above them were those going to the real championship: Esmeraldas Petrolero (Esmeraldas) – 8th with 33 points, LDU (Portoviejo) – 7th with 34 points, 9 de Octubre (Milagro) – 6th with 34 points, Universidad Catolica (Quito) – 5th with 34 points, El Nacional (Quito) – 4th with 35 points (they scored most goals at this stage – 70. As a contrast, America scored just 18), Deportivo Quito (Quito) – 3rd with 37 points (they got 1 bonus point for the final stage), Barcelona (Guayaquil) – 2nd with 41 points (2 bonus points), and Filanbanco (Guayaquil) – winners of this stage with 44 points (3 bonus points).
Octogonal Final. Has to be said in advance: 2 teams put all the effort just to qualify to the final stage and that was that – there later performance was pitiful, to say the least. Only 3 teams really went for the title and they were the strongest in the first stage.
LDU (Portoviejo) – 8th with 3 points. They did not win a single match and scored only 7 goals, receiving in the same time 42.
9 de Octubre (Milagro) – 7th with 8 points.
Universidad Catolica (Quito) – 6th with 12 points.
El Nacional (Quito) – 5th with 12 points. Strange as it is, but El Nacional seemingly exhausted itself in the first stage, losing steam even before the end of it. Second row from left: Roberto Abruzzesse, Carlos Ron, Marcelo Proano, Federico Lara, Luis Granda, Wilson Armas, Milton Rodriguez, Coronel Luis Tapia (fitness trainer) Luis Escalante (assistant coach), Luis Mosquera, Edwin Quinteros. First row: Marcelo Rangel (medic), Roque Valencia, Geovanny Mera, Elias De Negri, Jose Villafuerte, Ermen Benitez, Hans Maldonado, Fernando Baldeon.
Esmeraldas Petrolero (Esmeraldas) – 4th with 16 points. Great season for one of more obscure Ecuadorian clubs. They really tried to compete, but unfortunately had no team strong enough for something better.
Filanbanco (Guayaquil) – 3rd with 20 points. Those were the best years of a club entirely forgotten now, if it exist at all. It was just meteoric burst in the first half of the 1980s – coming from nowhere and quickly disappearing. They won confidently the first stage, but were not much in the most important second stage, so putting them among the leaders is more of a jest: they were close only because of the 3 bonus points. Still, it was great season. Standing from left: Freddy Bravo, Luis Carlos Macedo (Brazilian), Carlos Calderon, Carlos Montes de Oca, Noe (Brazilian), Luis Preciado. First row: Luis Capurro, Morales, Jose Valencia, Faustino Alonso (Paraguayan), Marcelo Hurtado.
Deportivo Quito (Quito) – 2nd with 21 points. Bonus points or not bonus points, Deportivo Quito settled for second best: they were almost equal to the new champions when it came to winning games – 10 – but lost way too many to be able to challenge the leaders: 4.
Barcelona (Guayaquil) was really flying at the final stage: 11 wins, 2 ties and only one lost game. 29-5 goal-difference. They started with 2 bonus points the Octogonal Final, but did not need them at all. Anyhow, with them, they finished with 26 points – 5 points ahead of Deportivo Quito. Thus, Barcelona won its 8th title. The players are practically unknown outside Ecuador, but there is interesting other aspect: look at the numbers. Big individual numbers are historically attributed to Ajax (Amsterdam) revolution in the early 1970s – a practice not followed, we think, except in ‘weird’ North America (but there it has nothing to do with Ajax’s example). Teams used standard 1 to 11 numbers up to the 1990s… well, not true. South American clubs, especially of ‘lesser countries’, used individual big numbers often, probably before Ajax, before 1970. So, here is a casual example – only three players use ‘normal’ numbers; may be 4 if we assume the goalkeeper played with number 1. The rest… blame it on baseball. Most likely on baseball, for ice-hockey has no influence in South America and basketball was still quite conservative in that. The only problem with such numbers is that one cannot tell players’ positions – when it comes to fairly unknown squads, regular numbers helped to figure out who was defender, who was a striker. With Barcelona, one can be sure only of the goalkeeper and perhaps that Toninho Viera is a central defender. The rest could be anything… but champions they were.