Independiente del Valle

Overview

Club de Alto Rendimiento Especializado Independiente del Valle, known simply as Independiente del Valle, is a professional football club based in Sangolquí, Ecuador that currently plays in the Ecuadorian Serie A. Founded in 1958, the club plays its home games at Estadio Banco Guayaquil, which opened in March 2021 and has a capacity of 12,000. In the 2013 Serie A season Independiente finished runners-up and they won their first league title in 2021. After being runners up twice consecutively in 2023 and 2024 to LDU Quito, they captured their second-ever league title in 2025, coming first in the first hexagonal. In CONMEBOL competitions they reached the final of the 2016 Copa Libertadores after famously defeating powerhouses River Plate and Boca Juniors. They won their first Copa Sudamericana title in 2019, and three years later the club would become one of the few two-time Sudamericana champions after defeating São Paulo in the 2022 final. A year later in 2023, they beat 2022 Copa Libertadores champions Flamengo in the Recopa Sudamericana, historically at the Maracana, winning 5-4 on penalties, an achievement rare to countries outside Brazil and Argentina. Independiente have a renowned youth academy. Notable players they have produced include Junior Sornoza, Cristian Ramírez, Gonzalo Plata, Moisés Caicedo, Piero Hincapié, Willian Pacho and Kendry Páez.