Crystal Palace

Crystal Palace

Crystal Palace                  

Crystal Palace Football Club are an professional football club based in South Norwood, London England. They are currently playing in the English Premier League. In the 2012–13 Football League season, Palace finished fifth and gained promotion to the Premier League through the play-offs. Red and Blue are their theame colour, although they had adopted a claret and pale blue strip of Aston

Crystal Palace

Villa in their early years. The club was established at The Crystal Palace in the year of 1905 to introduce a team to the local population, who regularly supported the FA Cup Final in sizeable numbers, which was played at the sports stadium, in Crystal Palace Park. Failing to gain election to The Football League, Palace instead joined the Southern Football League Second Division, playing home games at The Crystal Palace, inspiration for the club's initial nickname, "The Glaziers". Palace won the Division and promotion in their first season, and played in the Southern League First Division for the next fifteen years.

Crystal Palace

In 1920 the Southern League Division One formed the Football League Third Division. Palace won the division and gained promotion to the Second Division, where they spent four seasons before suffering relegation to the Third Division South. In 1958 a league re-organisation saw Palace become founder members of Division Four. Over the next eleven years the club moved from the lowest rung of English Football to the highest, reaching the First Division in 1969. In 1973 the club modernised its image, changing the nickname from The Glaziers to "The Eagles" and ending the 68-year association with claret and blue by introducing the red-and-blue vertical stripes now associated with the club. The club stabilised itself in the top two divisions with successive promotions in 1977 and 1979. The period from 1989–91 saw Steve Coppell guide the team to an FA Cup Final and third place in the First Division. Palace became founder members of the Premier League in 1992, but were relegated the same season. Palace entered administration in both 2000 and 2010, and are now owned by a consortium of four. The club achieved promotion back to the
Premier League under manager Ian Holloway with a 1–0 win over Watford in the Football League play-offs in May 2013.

Crystal Palace

Crystal Palace

Crystal Palace initially played their games in the grounds of The Crystal Palace, but the First World War saw them forced to move out, and they enjoyed a number of seasons at both the Herne Hill Velodrome and The Nest. Since 1925, Palace have played their home games at Selhurst Park. They have a fierce rivalry with M23 neighbours Brighton & Hove Albion, with whom they have contested the M23 derby 98 times. They also enjoy rivalries with fellow South London teams Millwall and Charlton Athletic. The club's kit is currently made by Avec, a subsidiary of Nike, and the shirt sponsor is GAC Logistics. The club captain is Paddy McCarthy and the current player of the year is Mile Jedinak. Edmund Goodman is the club's longest serving manager, and Jim Cannon has made the most appearances for the club. Peter
Simpson is the club's top scorer for both one season and overall, netting 54 and 165 respectively. The highest transfer fee received has been for Wilfried Zaha from Manchester United in January 2013 and the highest paid has been to Peterborough United for Dwight Gayle in July 2013.

Cardiff City

Cardiff City

Cardiff city

Cardiff city 

Cardiff City Football Club is a professional football club situated in Cardiff, Wales that played in the English football league. The club is playing in the Premier League for the first time in the 2013–14 season. They play their home games at the Cardiff City Stadium, after moving from Ninian Park in 2009.
The club was established as Riverside A.F.C. in 1899 and is the only club from outside England to have won the FA Cup in 1927. The club won the Football League Championship title in the 2012–13 season and were selected for the top flight for the first time in 51 years. This followed two lost national cup finals, the 2008 FA Cup Final against Portsmouth and the 2012 Football League Cup Final against Liverpool, the latter being settled by a penalty shootout.
In 2012, Cardiff City was rebranded by the club's Malaysian owner, Vincent Tan. This included the change of the club's home colours and crest.

Early years

Cardiff City

Riverside A.F.C. was established in 1899 as a way of keeping players from the Riverside Cricket Club together and in shape during the winter months. Their first season saw them playing friendlies against local sides at their Sophia Gardens ground, but in 1900 they joined the Cardiff & District League for their first competitive season. In 1905 Cardiff was granted city status by King Edward VII, and as a result the club put in a request to change their name to Cardiff City, but the request was turned down as they were deemed to be not playing at a high enough level. To combat this they arranged to join the South Wales Amateur League in 1907 and the following year they were granted permission to change the name of the club to Cardiff City.
Interest in the club began to rise during this time, but they were forced to turn down the opportunity to join the newly formed Southern League Second Division due to the lack of facilities at their Sophia Gardens ground. Over the next two years Cardiff welcomed many of Britain's top sides to Cardiff, including Middlesbrough, Bristol City and Crystal Palace, with the matches being played at various grounds in Cardiff and nearby towns. The club would eventually move into their new ground, Ninian Park, in 1910. The club made its first signing the following year with the acquisition of Jack Evans from fellow Welsh club Cwmparc FC.

Cardiff City

With the new ground in place, Cardiff joined the Southern League Second Division, and Bartley Wilson was quick to hire the club's first manager in Davy McDougall, who became player-manager. Their first match was a 2–1 defeat to Aston Villa, in which new signing Evans scored the only Cardiff goal. They went on to finish in fourth place in their first year in the league. They stayed in the division for the next decade, apart from when the league was suspended due to the outbreak of World War I.

West Brom

West Brom

West Brom                          

West Bromwich Albion Football Club , also known as West Brom ,or WBA, is an English professional football club situated in West Bromwich in the West Midlands. The club was established in 1878 and has played at its home ground since 1900.

West Brom

Albion were one of the founding members of The Football League in 1888 and have spent the majority of their existence in the top tier of English football. They have been champions of England once, in 1919-20, but they more successed in the FA Cup, with five time wins. The first cup came in 1888, the year the league was founded, and the most recent in 1968, their last major trophy. They also won the Football League Cup at the first attempt in 1966. The club's longest consecutive period in the top division was
between 1949 and 1973, and from 1986 to 2002 they spent their longest ever period out of the top division. The 2013–14 season is their eighth season in the Premier League since 2002.
The team has played in blue and white stripes for most of the club's history. Albion have a number of long-standing rivalries with other West Midland clubs; their traditional rivals have always been Aston Villa, though rivalry also exists with Wolverhampton Wanderers, with whom they contest the Black Country derby.

Southampton

Southampton F.C.

Southampton F.C.               

The Southampton F.C. home ground is the St Mary's Stadium, where the club moved to in 2001 from The Dell. The club has been nicknamed "The Saints" since its inception in 1885 due to its history as a church football team, founded as St Mary's Church of England Young Men's Association and has since generally played in red and white shirts.
The club has a long standing rivalry with Portsmouth due to its close proximity and both cities' respective maritime history. Matches between the two sides are known as the South Coast Derby.

Southampton F.C.

Southampton F.C.

The club has won the FA Cup once in 1976, and their highest-ever league finish was second in the First Division in 1983–84. Southampton were relegated from the Premier League on 15 May 2005 ending 27 successive seasons of top division football for the club.

After three seasons playing in the Championship, the Saints were further relegated to League One in 2009. After two years playing football in the third tier, the club secured back to back promotions under the management of Nigel Adkins. Adkins
was replaced in January 2013 by former Espanyol manager Mauricio Pochettino, who secured The Saints a 14th place finish in their first season back in the top flight and the club's best ever Premier League start the following season.

Stoke City

Stoke city                                                 

Stoke City

Stoke City Football Club. Stoke City F.C. is an English association football club based in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire. The club was formed in 1863 as Stoke Ramblers F.C., and played their first competitive match in November 1883, when they entered the First Round of the 1883–84 FA Cup. In 1888 they joined the inaugural Football League thus becoming founding members. The club was renamed Stoke City F.C. in 1925, and they moved to Britannia Stadium in 1997.

Stoke City

Stoke City

Newcastle

Newcastle                                              

Newcastle

Newcastle United Football Club is an English professional football club situated in Newcastle upon Tyne. The club was established in 1892, by the merger of Newcastle East End and Newcastle West End, and has played at its current home ground, St James' Park, since. The ground was developed into an all-seater stadium in the mid-1990s and now has a capacity of 52,387. The club has been a member of the Premier League for all but two years of the competition's history, and has never dropped below English football's second tier since joining the Football League in 1893. In 2007, long term chairman and owner Sir John Hall sold his share in the club to Mike Ashley. In 2013, after an underpar season, the club appointed Joe Kinnear as their football director after a strong connection with Mike Ashley.
They have won four League Championship titles and six FA Cups, as well as the 1969 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup and the 2006 UEFA Intertoto Cup. Newcastle United has the ninth highest total of major honours won by an English club. The club's most successful period was between 1904 and 1910, when they won an FA Cup and three of their First Division titles. The club is the twentieth richest club in the world in terms of annual revenue, generating €115.3m in 2012. Newcastle’s best ever placing is 5th in the World.
They have a fierce local rivalry with Sunderland, and the two clubs have engaged in the Tyne–Wear derby since 1898. The club's traditional kit colours are black and white striped shirts, black shorts and black socks. Their traditional crest takes elements of the city coat of arms, which features two seahorses.

Hull City

Hull City                                                 

Hull City

Kingston upon Hull, usually referred to as Hull, is a city and unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. Hull has a resident population of 256,100 (2011 est.). The Larger Urban Zone (LUZ) population stands at 573,300.
The Hull city was founded late in the 12th century. The monks of Meaux Abbey needed a port where the wool from their estates could be exported. They chose a place at the junction of the rivers Hull and Humber to build a quay.
The exact year Hull was founded is not known but it was first mentioned in 1193. It was called Wyke on Hull. Renamed Kings town upon Hull by King Edward I in 1299, the town and city of Hull has served as market town, military supply port, a trading hub, fishing and whaling centre, and industrial metropolis^.
Hull was an early theatre of battle in the English Civil Wars. Its 18th-century Member of Parliament, William Wilberforce, played a key role in the abolition of the slave trade in Britain.
The city is unique in the UK in having had a municipally-owned telephone system from 1902, sporting cream, not red, telephone boxes.
After suffering heavy damage during the Second World War (the 'Hull Blitz'), Hull weathered a period of post-industrial decline, during which the city gained unfavourable results on measures of social deprivation, education and policing. During the early 21st-century spending boom (before the late 2000s recession) the city saw large amounts of new retail, commercial, housing and public service construction spending.

Hull City

Established tourist attractions include the historic Old Town and Museum Quarter, Hull Marina and The Deep, a city landmark. The redevelopment of one of Hull's main thoroughfares,
Ferensway, included the opening of St. Stephen's Hull and the new Hull Truck Theatre. Spectator sporting activities include Premier League football and Super League Rugby. The KC Stadium houses the Hull City football club and Hull FC rugby club and Craven Park is home to rugby club Hull Kingston Rovers. Hull is also home to the Elite Ice Hockey League Hull Stingrays.
In November 2013, it was announced that Hull had won the UK City of Culture 2017 award.