Caires Sports

Caires Sports Club are a multi-sports community organisation in Caires, north-east Candelaria, best known for their former professional football team, Caires Sports, which played in the CMSC of Candelaria And Marquez.

The football team was created in 1909, nine years after the establishment of the club itself, initially in the entertainment district of Rider Castle before moving to a more central, purpose-built, stadium in 1927. During the CMSC era the club relocated again to the Docklands area and the Kaleta Online Dome, later renamed the AAC-Dimrar Dome, which remains an important venue for concerts and exhibitions despite the collapse of professional football in the Candelarias. Becoming professional in order to join the National Foot-Ball League, the Knights won three titles in the late fifties and were a constant force in the sixties, under managers (and later Chairman and Director of Football respectively) Emrah Demir and Virgillio Hatlbovic. The club was blighted however by a hooligan element, the power and influence of the ultras group known as the Cavalry rising to the point that its leader was elected Chairman whilst still serving a year-long prison sentence for GBH. In 1965 they became the first side voted out of the NFBL by their fellow clubs.

Their place was taken by the Caires 59ers – the future Caires FC – and the Knights returned to their amateur roots, working hard to root out the violent element among their support base. With former forward Brendan Lundle as head coach they began to experiment with what were, for C&M at the time, highly progressive formations such as ‘anything other than 4-4-2’, and the team took the second CMS Cup of what would become the CMSC era. Turning professional once more they finished runners-up in the CMSC V season, but fell out of contention as other sides worked out their tactics. Despite large home and travelling support the Knights were relegated in XIII and absent from the top-flight for five seasons.

In XXIV, the season prior to what would become known as the ‘International Era’, Carl Woods guided the team back up to fifth place with a gung-ho style that saw them finish as top scorers, and with the leakiest defence bar one. The following year however they were relegated once more, and continued a yo-yo existence that saw them definitively overhauled as Caires’ top team by Caires City, an upstart club founded by Caires Sports fans disillusioned by the then ownership. That ownership would soon be bought out by dotcom millionaire and local politician Stan Kaleta, whose own rule during the first half of the International Era also attracted increasing fan opposition. By the XXXIII season however the club had developed what would become a deeply enmeshed relationship with Yaforite football, that had begun when then manager Matt Sampson had perceptively plucked combative wide man Ahershk Valinial from the Chelmar FC bench after watching him for his country’s under-21s at the Di Bradini Cup. Following the Kaleta group’s financial meltdown, the club was gleefully added to the portfolio of automobile manufacturer and energy supplier AAC-Dimrar, the second largest corporation in the Grand Democratic Duchy, with Jagor Aiza himself becoming chairman. In the years that followed, Caires Sports became the most foreign of any team in the CMSC, exploiting every residency and ancestry loophole they could in order to fill their squad full of Yaforites. At times playing no more than two or three Candelariasians, and with a defensive style that put KT Hotspur to shame, this era of Knights won few new fans across the country but delivered three straight sixth-place finishes.

For several years the veteran coach Keron Alhrem was at the helm, though as time went on whispers increased that the former Yafor 2 manager was no longer in full possession of his faculties and had left day-to-day management responsibilities to a succession of assistant coaches, from Shaan Magerin to Damien Dulars. The team suffered an unexpected relegation in XXXVIII and returned the following year only after barely scraping into the play-offs. Now coached by Mosada Juhan, an unnervingly offensively-minded Caires Sports achieved their best finish of the International Era in the CMSC’s final season, closing out their history with a fifth-place finish – the veteran Valinial, having returned rejuvenated from a year spent finding himself in his homeland, considered one of the league’s stars of the season.

In the aftermath of the Beatrice Event and Candelariasian professional football’s demise, the club briefly took on a new life as Caires Sports Club Indigar in the LIDYT, at a new AAC-Dimrar Dome in Indigar, Yafor 2. Juhan and most of his playing staff – Candelariasians Luke Alsheris and Jarrell Reuberson-Mohammed included – relocated to join a new franchise that was instantly installed as title favourites. Then the LIDYT promptly went the same way as the CMSC and the management and players were left marooned once more. Sucks to be them.

The original, Candelarian, Caires Sports Club still exists, as one of the larger amateur sports clubs in the islands with hundreds of athletes, swimmers and gymnasts on their books. The Dome is owned by the city council.

Notable CMSC1 International Era players
Goalkeepers
 * Andy Harford
 * Ahadris Kolukernin
 * Amern S’toris

Defenders
 * Jalan Akhraan
 * Jaon Endekov
 * Sela J’dankor
 * Sifmir K’latris
 * Matt La Vista
 * Harris Matthews
 * Grey Mendoza
 * Bo Phelps
 * Jono Plunkett
 * Anamer Tascarnin
 * Corlan T’saal
 * Falia T’saar
 * Tonzing Wang

Midfielders
 * Sorin Acraan
 * Alager Adirondu
 * Luke Alsheris
 * Ashley Ashby
 * Morgan Banz
 * Aranar Made’er
 * Jennifer Majorheily-Orinova
 * Jarrell Reuberson-Mohammed
 * Ahershk Valinial

Forwards
 * Lawrence Amey
 * Josh Belmore
 * Vorin Dariegan
 * Archer French
 * Kim Mihyeon
 * Freire Muniz Allman
 * Robbie Sinjinir