Deportivo Pereira

Early years

While there are several amateur teams from the Risaralda Department in the Third Division (Primera C), Pereira is the department's only professional team. Deportivo Pereira was founded on 12 February 1944 by Pedro Patiño 'Peruco', Luis Carlos Marulanda, Rogelio Díaz 'Control', Faustino Chiquito y Gabriel Cardona Rojas, aiming to end the rivalry between the local clubs Deportivo Otún and Vidriocol. On 12 March 1944 they played their first game, facing Guadalajara de Buga at Estadio Alberto Mora Mora in Pereira.

Deportivo Pereira made its First Division debut (Primera A) in the 1949 season, replacing Universidad, a football club founded in Bogotá that had played its previous season in the Pearl of the Otún River, nickname of the city of Pereira, but moved back to Bogotá for that season. Precisely, the team played its first game against that same team, losing 2–1. The team's first goal was scored by Ecuadorian player Humberto Suárez. Its first victory was against Atlético Bucaramanga, with a final score of 2–1 and goals scored by Omar Barahona and José “Mico” Zapata. A second victory was obtained against Bucaramanga, this time away from home and by a score of 4–3. The team's first victory playing at home was on 9 October 1949, beating Huracán de Medellín 4–1, with goals scored by Carmelo Enrique Colombo, José "Mico" Zapata, Inocencio Paz Lasso "Cencio" and an own goal from Huracan's player Santos Isaza. The first top scorer of the "Matecaña" (another of Pereira's nicknames) team was the Colombian Inocencio Paz Lasso "Cencio", with 11 goals. The team finished the season in last place with only 14 points.

The team's most successful campaigns were in 1952, 1962, 1966, and 1974, in which the team placed third. However the most remembered team was the one that competed in the 1982 season which was led by Gilberto Osorio. Their roster included Óscar Héctor Quintabani, "Ratón" Echeverri, Víctor Longo, Henry Viáfara, Gilberto Cabrera, Farid Perchy, Sergio Cierra, Benjamin "Mincho" Cardona, Eduardo Emilio Vilarete, Jairo "Chiqui" Aguirre, and as substitutes goalkeeper Reynel Ruiz, midfielders Manzi and Ponciano Castro and strikers Abel Augusto Lobatón, Hernán "Pistolero" Villa and Iván Darío "Chumi" Castañeda. The team finished the tournament in fourth place.

Deportivo Pereira also gained recognition for the large number of Paraguayan players that have joined its ranks starting from its early years, beginning with the arrival of player and manager César López Fretes, who managed the team for seven seasons between 1964 and 1970. The first Paraguayan in the squad was striker Carmelo Enrique Colombo who arrived in 1949, and from that moment onwards over 100 Paraguayan footballers have played for Deportivo Pereira throughout its history. By 1951, 10 out of the 11 starting players were Paraguayans who had participated in the 1950 FIFA World Cup with their national team, including Enrique Ávalos, Marcelino Vargas, and López Fretes himself. Other outstanding Paraguayan players at Deportivo Pereira were Casimiro Ávalos, who is the club's all-time top scorer with 141 goals, Ángel Chávez who played 276 matches with the team, Apolinar Paniagua, Alcides Sossa and Benicio Ferreira, among several others who even established their permanent residency in the city.

First relegation and return to Primera A

In 1991, Colombia's Dimayor created the second tier tournament Categoría Primera B, granting its champion the chance to promote to the first division (which became Categoría Primera A) and replace the last-placed team from the league, which would be demoted to the second division. In 1995, the team got a decent sixth place that placed it comfortably far from the second tier. However, during the 1997 Adecuación tournament, the team was relegated to Primera B for the first time after a 3–2 win for Deportivo Unicosta against Millonarios.

Deportivo Pereira played in the second tier for three seasons between 1998 and 2000, placing as runners-up in 1998 behind Deportivo Pasto and third the following year. In 2000 they eventually won the Primera B tournament and returned to the top tier. In that season they were led by coach Walter Aristizábal and players such as Rafael Castillo, Guillermo Berrío, Hernán Darío Cardona, Daniel Vélez and Jairo Serna.

Ups and downs and second relegation

Since their return to the top flight for the 2001 season, Deportivo Pereira reached the semi-finals of the Primera A tournament five times: in the 2003 Apertura, 2005 Finalización, 2006 Apertura, 2008 Finalización, and 2009 Finalización. The best campaign of those was the 2008 one, in which the team managed by Luis Fernando Suárez advanced to the semi-finals in sixth place with 28 points and ended missing out on the final after placing second in their group behind the eventual champions América de Cali. In the final table of that tournament, Deportivo Pereira placed fourth, behind América, runners-up Independiente Medellín, and Deportes Tolima.

In spite of those good campaigns, Pereira were still troubled with relegation: in 2007, the team finished second to last in the relegation table and had to play a relegation playoff against the 2007 Primera B runners-up Academia. Deportivo Pereira were able to keep their place in Primera A, beating Academia 4–2 on aggregate thanks to striker Óscar Restrepo. The following year, they only avoided relegation on the last day of the regular season, defeating Atlético Bucaramanga 3–0 and sending them to the second tier instead, and in 2009 they had to play the relegation playoff again, beating Bucaramanga 5–3 on aggregate.

A democratization process of the club was started by the end of 2008. After several months of legal processes, the club was confirmed by the División Mayor del Fútbol Colombiano (Dimayor) and the Colombian Football Federation as Deportivo Pereira S.A., led by Luis Fernando Osorio Acevedo. However in September 2010 it returned to its previous owners, the López Bedoya family, as they argued that Osorio had failed to pay the agreed fee for their shares.

In the 2010 Finalización tournament, Deportivo Pereira failed to win a single game in the first stage, placing second-from-bottom with nine draws and nine losses, and the situation did not improve in the immediately following tournament, the 2011 Apertura, in which they only won one game out of 18 and placed last, that only victory being in the derby against Once Caldas where they broke a record 34-game winless streak. Although they had chances to qualify for the final stages of the 2011 Finalización tournament, those previous poor campaigns took their toll in the relegation table and Deportivo Pereira were relegated to Primera B for the second time on 5 November 2011 by losing 1–0 against Deportes Tolima in Ibagué.