Valencia

Valencia Club de Fútbol (also known as Valencia or Los Che) are one of the most successful Spanish professional football club based in Valencia. Valencia has won six La Liga titles, six Copa del Rey trophies, three UEFA Cups, one UEFA Cup Winners' Cup and two UEFA Super Cups.  They have been UEFA Champions League final runners-up in 2000 and 2001, losing to La Liga rivals Real Madrid in 2000 and German club Bayern Munich in 2001. Valencia is the third most popular football team in Spain , only behind Real Madrid and FC Barcelona . It is also one of the biggest clubs in the world in terms of number of associates (registered paying supporters) of more than 45,000. Valencia was founded in 1919, and has played their home football matches at the 53,311-seater Estadio Mestalla since 1923. They are soon to move into the 75,000-seater Nou Mestalla in the north-west portion of the city in 2009. Their first match took place in Castellón, on the 21st of May of 1919. Valencia’s rival was the Valencian Gimnástico, who won 1-0. In 1923, Valencia became regional champions and could participate, for the first time in their history, in the Copa del Rey. Three or four years after their founding, Valencia was already the most fearsome enemy for other teams with increasing popularity. The first league championship, in which Valencia participated, was in the 28-29 seasons. In their third season in the Second Division, Valencia got the promotion they had longed for to the First Division. During and after the Civil War in 1939, many of the football players left the team and the military also intervened in daily life and football. But in the 1941 Cup, versus Español, it was the first victory after two decades of existence. In the 46-47 seasons Valencia won their third league title in a row. The 50-51 seasons were the first in which 16 teams took part. Valencia’s play in the championship was very uneven. The 52-53 season was good for Valencia and managed to be runner-up. In January of 1956 Manolo Mestre made his debut with Valencia, a football player born in Oliva, who became the Valencia player who won most caps in League matches until Ricardo Arias surpassed him in the nineties. With the start of the 76-77 seasons, Valencia began a completely different era. Kempes is the most important footballer to have played for Valencia. He was the top goalscorer of the Spanish League in the 76-77 (24 goals) and 77-78 (28 goals) seasons, top goalscorer in the World Cup in 1978 and key player in winning the 1979 Copa del Rey and the 1980 European Cup Winners Cup. In 78-79 seasons Valencia won the Cup after defeating Real Madrid by 2-0. The 1980-81 year saw Valencia giving average performance as the two key players Mario Alberto Kempes and Fernando Morena returned back to their countries of origin. The team confirmed the relegation by losing 3-0 at the Nou Camp and two draws with Cádiz and Betis in the 86-86 season. Fifteen years later, the relegation was forgotten about and Valencia rubbed shoulders with the best Spanish and European teams once again. The 1989-90 season was brilliant for Valencia. The team played a wonderful league campaign and put in an acceptable Copa del Rey performance, they played two rounds of the UEFA Cup, against Victoria Bucarest and FC Porto led by Rabah Madjer, which saw Valencia unfairly eliminated. In the 1991-92 season, Valencia invested heavily on reinforcing the team, the most remarkable ones were the Panamanian forward Rommel Fernández and the highly talented Brazilian Leonardo. The 1995-96 season started with a new coach, the veteran Luis Aragonés who took Valencia to second place in the league within 4 points of the title with a team in which Zubizarreta, Camarasa, Fernando and Mijatovic stood out. Valencia started the 1999-2000 seasons by winning the Spanish Super Cup, beating FC Barcelona. Valencia finished third in the league, behind the champions, Deportivo and level on points with second placed Barcelona. But the biggest success was in the UEFA Champions League, for the first time in its history Valencia reached the European Cup final. Unfortunately, in the final played in Paris on 24 May 2000, Real Madrid beat Valencia 3-0. From 1999 up until the end of the 2004 season, Valencia had one of their most successful periods in the clubs history. With a total of 2 La Liga titles, 1 UEFA Cup, 1 Copa del Rey and 1 UEFA Super Cup, in these six years, no less than five first class titles and two UEFA Champions League finals had been achieved. The 2006/2007 season was a season with many difficulties; a season which started with realistic hopes of challenging for La Liga was disrupted, with a huge list of injuries to key players and internal arguments between Flores and new Sporting Director, the former captain Amedeo Carboni. Valencia ended the season in 4th place and was knocked out of the Champions League at the quarter-finals stage by Chelsea 3-2. Facts Full name: Valencia Club de Fútbol: Nickname: Los Che Founded: March 18, 1919 Ground: Mestalla, Valencia, Spain (Capacity 53,311) Chairman: Juan Bautista Soler Manager: Ronald Koeman League: La Liga HONOURS: Domestic ·         La Liga Champions o        Winners (6): 1941-42, 1943-44, 1946-47, 1970-71, 2001-02, 2003-04 o        Runners-up (6): 1947-48, 1948-49, 1952-53, 1971-72, 1989-90, 1995-96 ·         Copa del Rey o        Winners (6): 1940-41, 1948-49, 1953-54, 1966-67, 1978-79, 1998-99 o        Runners-up (10): 1933-34, 1936-37, 1943-44, 1944-45, 1945-46, 1951-52, 1969-70, 1970-71, 1971-72, 1994-95 ·         Supercopa de España o        Winners (2): 1949, 1999 o        Runners-up (2): 2002, 2004 ·         Segunda División o        Winners (2): 1930-31, 1986-87 European ·         UEFA Cup o        Winners (3): 1961-62, 1962-63, 2003-04 o        Runners-up (1): 1963-64 ·         UEFA Cup Winners' Cup o        Winners (1): 1979-80 ·         UEFA Super Cup o        Winners (2): 1980, 2004 ·         UEFA Intertoto Cup o        Winners (1): 1998 ·         UEFA Champions League o        Runners-up (2): 1999-00, 2000-01