On 28th June 1992, Villarreal got promoted to the Second Division after beating Linense
Today, 28th June 2017, marks 25 years since the day Villarreal got promoted to the Second Division. A date that went down in the club’s history, as it was the first step on the road to the Submarine getting promoted to the First Division, Spanish football’s top flight, which came to pass five years later. The club has now been playing professional football for a quarter of a century.
Promotion to the Second Division for Villarreal came in June 1992 after a long, tough and very exciting season and subsequent promotion play-off phase. In the league, the Submarine finished in second place in Group 3 after normal season play, with 51 points (19 wins, 13 draws and 6 losses; 61 goals for and 39 against) and then had to play in the promotion play-offs, which they ended up winning by beating UD Salamanca, Girona FC and RB Linense.
The promotion play-offs started off brilliantly, with two wins against Girona (1-2, Julio Pérez and Adriano) and Salamanca (2-1, Mateu and Planelles), but in the third match Salamanca beat the Yellows (2-0). One week later, on 15th June, Girona inflicted another blow on Villarreal’s hopes with a convincing 2-4 win at the El Madrigal stadium.
And when the situation couldn’t get much worse, Villarreal turned things around. In the last two matches, the side then managed by Esteban Linares beat Linense at the El Madrigal (1-0, Adriano) and guaranteed promotion against the Andalusian side in the second leg, with a 1-2 win (Alcañiz and Reyes) in the southern city of Línea de la Concepción. The Submarine won the group with eight points and made the longed for promotion to the Second Division a dream come true, a division that the Yellows have never been relegated from since.
Find out more about Villarreal CF’s history now: HISTORY
