Manchester City Football Club is an English football club based
in Manchester, that competes in the Premier League, the top flight of
English football. Founded in 1880 as St. Mark's (West Gorton), it became Ardwick Association Football Club in 1887 and Manchester City in 1894. The club's home ground is the City of Manchester Stadium in east Manchester, to which it moved in 2003, having played at Maine Road since 1923. Manchester City entered the Football League in 1899, and won their first FA Cup in 1904. It had its first period of success in the late 1960s, winning the League, FA Cup and League Cup under the management of Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison. After losing the 1981 FA Cup Final, the club went through a period of decline, which eventually saw them relegated as far down as third tier of English football by the end of the 1997–98 season. They since regained promotion to the top tier in 2001–02 and have remained a fixture in the Premier League since 2002–03. In 2008, Manchester City was purchase(parcest) by Abu Dhabi United Group for £200 million and received considerable financial investment. The club have won six domestic league titles. Under the management of Pep Guardiola they won the Premier League in 2018 becoming the only Premier League team to attain 100 points in a single season. In 2019, they won four trophies, completing an unprecedented sweep of all domestic trophies in England and becoming the first English men's team to win the domestic treble.[3] Manchester City's revenue was the fifth highest of a football club in the world in the 2018–19 season at 500 milions of pounds. [4]
Manchester City's home colours are sky blue and white. Traditional away kit colours have been either maroon or red and black; however, in recent years several different colours have been used. The origins of the club's home colours are unclear, but there is evidence that the club has worn blue since 1892 or earlier. A booklet entitled Famous Football Clubs – Manchester City published in the 1940s indicates that West Gorton (St. Marks) originally played in scarlet and black, and reports dating from 1884 describe the team wearing black jerseys bearing a white cross, showing the club's origins as a church side.[51] The red and black away colours used infrequently yet recurrently come from former assistant manager Malcolm Allison, who believed that adopting the colours of A.C. Milan would inspire City to glory.[52] Allison's theory worked, with City winning the 1969 FA Cup Final, 1970 League Cup Final and the 1970 European Cup Winners' Cup Final. City have previously worn three other badges on their shirts, prior to their current badge which was implemented in 2016. The first, introduced in 1970, was based on designs which had been used on official club documentation since the mid-1960s. It consisted of a circular badge which used the same shield as the current badge, inside a circle bearing the name of the club. In 1972, this was replaced by a variation which replaced the lower half of the shield with the red rose of Lancashire. On occasions when Manchester City played in a major cup final, the club wore shirts bearing a badge of the arms of the City of Manchester, as a symbol of pride in representing the city at a major event. This practice originated from a time when the players' shirts did not normally bear a badge of any kind.[53] The club has since abandoned the practice; for the 2011 FA Cup Final, its first in the 21st century, City used the usual badge with a special legend, but the Manchester coat of arms was included as a small monochrome logo in the numbers on the back of players' shirts. [54]
A new club badge was adopted in 1997 This badge was based on the arms of the city of Manchester, and consisted of a shield in front of a golden eagle. The eagle is an old heraldic symbol of the city of Manchester; a golden eagle was added to the city's badge in 1958 (but has since been removed), representing the growing aviation industry. The shield features a ship on its upper half representing the Manchester Ship Canal, and three diagonal stripes in the lower half symbolise the city's three rivers – the Irwell, the Irk and the Medlock. The bottom of the badge bears the motto "Superbia in Proelio", which translates as "Pride in Battle" in Latin. Above the eagle and shield are three stars, which are decorative. On 15 October 2015, following years of criticism from the fans over the design of the 1997 badge,[55] the club announced they intended to carry out a fan consultation on whether to disregard the club badge and institute a new design.[55] After the consultation, the club announced in late November 2015 the current club badge would be replaced by a new version which would be designed in the style of the older, circular variants.[56] The new badge was leaked two days early prior to the official on 26 December 2015 by the IPO when the design was trademarked on 22 December.[57] The new design was officially unveiled at the club's home match on 26 December against Sunderland.[58]
