Francisco Avilán Cruz (27 August 1947 – 5 February 2021) was a Mexican

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

and football manager.

Early life

Born in

Monterrey Monterrey ( , ) is the capital and largest city of the northeastern state of Nuevo León, Mexico, and the third largest city in Mexico behind Guadalajara and Mexico City. Located at the foothills of the Sierra Madre Oriental, the city is anchor ...

, Mexico, Avilán's father was an amateur footballer and his brother, Arnulfo, played for

. His other brother, Pedro, played in the Mexican second division. He followed in the footsteps of his brother Arnulfo when he joined

in 1958.

Club career

Avilán was handed his first team debut by Uruguayan manager

Roberto Scarone Roberto Scarone Rivera (16 July 1917 – 25 April 1994) was a Uruguayan football player and manager. He is mainly known for his successful managing spell at the helm of the Uruguayan powerhouse Peñarol in the early 1960s. Career Scarone starte ...

in 1964 against

Club Deportivo Nacional Club Deportivo Nacional is a Mexican football team founded in Guadalajara, Jalisco, México in 1916. The club won its first title in 1922, playing in the second division. It also won seven Liga Amateurs de Jalisco between the 1925–1926 and 1938 ...

, helping Monterrey to a 2–0 win. He remained with Monterrey until 1970, when he had a short stint with

Atlas An atlas is a collection of maps; it is typically a bundle of maps of Earth or of a region of Earth. Atlases have traditionally been bound into book form, but today many atlases are in multimedia formats. In addition to presenting geographic ...

, before returning to Monterrey. He signed with

Guadalajara Guadalajara ( , ) is a metropolis in western Mexico and the capital of the list of states of Mexico, state of Jalisco. According to the 2020 census, the city has a population of 1,385,629 people, making it the 7th largest city by population in Me ...

before retiring in 1974.

International career

He was called up to the

Mexico national football team The Mexico national football team () represents Mexico in international football and is governed by the Mexican Football Federation (). It competes as a member of CONCACAF. Mexico has qualified to seventeen World Cups and has qualified conse ...

on several occasions, making two appearances between 1971 and 1972. In doing so, he became the first Monterrey player to represent Mexico.

Managerial career

Avilán returned to Monterrey at the end of the 1970s, initially managing the youth sector, which included future Mexican internationals

Francisco Javier Cruz Francisco Javier Cruz Jiménez (born 24 May 1966) is a Mexican former professional footballer who played for Monterrey and Tigres UANL, becoming one of the few players to be successful in both professional teams from Monterrey. He is nicknamed ...

Héctor Becerra Héctor Becerra (born May 10, 1965) is a Mexican football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that ...

and

Missael Espinoza Eduardo Missael Espinoza Padilla (born 12 April 1965) is a Mexican former professional Association football, footballer who played as a midfielder. Club career A versatile player capable of lining up in the attack or on the right side of midfie ...

. After studying football management in Yugoslavia, Avilán was named manager of Monterrey in 1984. With signings such as

Guillermo Muñoz Guillermo Muñoz Ramírez (born 20 October 1961) is a Mexican former football defender, who was nicknamed "El Turbo". He has 20 caps for the Mexico national team between 1987 and 1993, and on the squad at the 1993 Copa América. He made his d ...

, he led Monterrey to the México 86 title, the first in the club's history. While serving as manager of the

Mexico national under-20 football team The Mexico national under-20 football team represents Mexico in association football at the under-20 age level, and is controlled by the Mexican Football Federation (FMF), the governing body of football in Mexico. The team has won the CONCACAF Un ...

, it was found Mexico had knowingly fielded four overage players at the

1988 CONCACAF U-20 Tournament The 1988 CONCACAF Under-20 Championship was held in Guatemala, although it has also been reported that the tournament was held in Trinidad and Tobago. It also served as qualification for the 1989 FIFA World Youth Championship. Qualification Ot ...

. The scandal, known as

Cachirules The Cachirules scandal was a 1988 association football scandal in which the Mexican Football Federation (FEMEXFUT) was found to have knowingly used at least four overage players (Gerardo Jiménez, José de la Fuente, José Luis Mata, and Aurelio R ...

, saw several Mexican officials banned from football for life; however, Avilán himself received no sanction, and said that if he had known these players were overaged, he would not have selected them. Avilán returned to management in 2008, when he was named manager of

Jaguares de Chiapas Chiapas Fútbol Club, commonly known as Jaguares de Chiapas, was a football club based in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Mexico, that played in the Mexican football league system Liga MX. The team played their home matches at the Estadio Víctor Manuel Reyn ...

on an interim basis.

Death

Avilán died in February 2021, following a bout of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

Career statistics

International

Managerial statistics

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Avilán, Francisco 1947 births 2021 deaths Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico Mexican footballers Mexico international footballers Sportspeople from Monterrey Association football forwards C.F. Monterrey players Atlas F.C. footballers C.D. Guadalajara footballers C.F. Monterrey managers Tigres UANL managers Chiapas F.C. managers Mexican expatriate football managers Mexican expatriate sportspeople in Honduras Expatriate football managers in Honduras